Music Week

Expanded blog post, November archive (finished).

Tweet: Music Week: 52 albums, 8 A-list (+2 A)

Music: Current count 41262 [41210] rated (+52), 2 [9] unrated (-7).

I posted another substantial Speaking of Which last night (5716 words, 106 links). The writing went late, and I had to cut it off with a lot of unfinished business. In particular, I was taken aback by opposition to my plan to end the war by splitting Gaza off from Israel. My intro starts to sketch out the distinction between left as teleology and as practical politics -- one that should be easy enough to keep clear, but again and again we see practical proposals that would actually do some good torpedoed by people who quite rightly want something better. I might get a better response pitching my plan as the only achievable "two-state solution" to the mainstream crowd who still entertains the possibility. (It is the only version that Israel could be persuaded to agree to, and as we should know by now, nothing is possible without Israel's consent.) But no one in that crowd reads me or cares what I think, so I find myself in this dark spiral, ever more convinced of the necessity of moving left, and of the impossibility of actual left politics.

That's already more than what I meant to say here. Other than to note that if I was serious about political writing, I'd be shopping around an essay right now on "Why I've Never Called Myself Pro-Palestinian, and Why It Doesn't Bother Me if You Do." The first part of that I've been considering for a while. The second part is a reaction to a recent conversation with a friend complaining about "the pro-Palestinian left." My core point is that the left is not your problem. Good people having occasional bad thoughts is not your problem. Your problem is quite simply on the right.

Meanwhile, we have quite a bit of business to deal with below.

I'm continuously updating my year-end lists for Jazz and Non-Jazz. Currently there are 65+1 A-list entries in jazz, 44+3 in Non-Jazz. The + numbers are albums in previous years' tracking files that I only got to this year. Other 2022 releases appear in the main lists if they weren't even in the tracking files (or were released on or after Dec. 1, 2022).

The split has increased in recent weeks, as I've focused on new jazz, and had little time to do any non-jazz prospecting.

I've made two promotions this week from A- to A (Irreversible Entanglements and Steve Lehman). These were not surprises, nor would the current number 4: James Brandon Johnson's For Mahalia, With Love.

One thing to note is that my entire 2022 demo queue has been reviewed. No new mail this past week, but I have two unopened packages today: one from Portugal, the other from France, so they are probably 2022 releases. I am sitting on a couple of 2024 releases, but I'm in no hurry for them (well, maybe for Ballister).

It's almost two weeks since the first batch of ballot invites for the 18th Annual Francis Davis Jazz Critics Poll went out. I have 24 ballots counted, naming 264 albums. (Maximum is 16 per ballot: 10 new, 3 old, 1 each vocal, debut, latin.) As new records receive votes, I add them to my tracking file and to the unheard section of my 2024 jazz list. (Note to self: I should write a program to pull up all of the albums with jazz poll votes, sorted by artist so I don't give away the standings.)

Hopefully the ballots will start rolling in soon. Deadline is December 15. I still have a bunch of notes on possible voters. I'm not done sending out invites, but I haven't had much time to vet them yet. But this is probably your last chance to make a case, for you or someone else, to vote. My approximate guidelines are that you should have listed to more than 200 new jazz records in the last year, and that you should have written about ten or more. As for "broadcast journalists," I have no idea what the criteria should be. Francis Davis invited several dozen, and a few others nominated themselves or others. They've generally been a credit to the Poll, but as someone who literally never listens to jazz radio, I'm in no position to judge.

It's impossible to tell whether we'll wind up with more than last year's 151 voters, but it is very likely that we'll see an increase in ballots from outside the US.

One thing I haven't done yet is set up an EOY aggregator, like I've did for 2022, 2021, etc. It's easy enough to do, and it's probably the only way I'll ever get a handle on non-jazz prospects. But my first glance at the AOTY Aggregate is pretty dismal (top 20, w/my grades): Lankum [**], Sufjan Stevens [*], Young Fathers [***], Julie Byrne [**], Boygenius [B], Wednesday [*], Blur [*], Lana Del Rey [**], PJ Harvey [*], Grian Chatten [**], Caroline Polachek [*], Mitski [*], Paul Simon [B], Yo La Tengo [A-], Anohni [**], Nation of Language [?], JPEGMafia & Danny Brown [*], Kelela [*], Yussef Dayes [A- this week], Overmono [*]. A/A- down in the next 25: Billy Woods & Kenny Segal (28), Robert Forster (32), Joanna Sternberg (43), Olivia Rodrigo (45). That's only 6 of 44 non-jazz A/A- records I've already found this year.

Of course, the real value of the EOY lists isn't who gets the most mentions, but what are the interesting records deep down in isolated lists. I will note that so far 7 of the top 10 new releases in our Jazz Critics Poll are A/A- in my book. That's a freakishly high share, but evens out with just 2 in the second 10, and just 1 of the second 20. Also, after 27 you get into the single-vote albums, most of which won't get more than a couple more votes, if that.

November Streamnotes archive is closed, but not indexed yet.

New records reviewed this week:

• Ambrose Akinmusire: Beauty Is Enough (2023, Origami Harvest): [sp]: B+(*)
• Balimaya Project: When the Dust Settles (2023, New Soil): [sp]: B+(***)
• Jerry Bergonzi: Extra Extra (2023, Savant): [sp]: B+(**)
• John Butcher/Pat Thomas/Dominic Lash/Steve Noble: Fathom (2021 [2023], 577): [dl]: B+(*)
• Gunhild Carling: Good Evening Cats (2022, Jazz Art): [sp]: B+(***)
• Daniel Carter/Leo Genovese/William Parker/Francisco Mela: Shine Hear Vol. 1 (2021 [2023], 577): [dl]: B+(**)
• Joan Chamorro & Friends: Jazz House Sessions With Scott Hamilton (2023, Associació Sant Andreu Jazz Band): [sp]: B+(**)
• Yussef Dayes: Black Classical Music (2023, Brownswood/Nonesuch): [sp]: A-
• Paul Dunmall Ensemble: It's a Matter of Fact (2022 [2023], Discus Music): [bc]: B+(**)
• Paul Dunmall: Bright Light a Joyous Celebration (2022 [2023], Discus Music): [bc]: A-
• Paul Dunmall New Quartet: World Without (2021 [2023], 577): [dl]: B+(**)
• Peter Evans Being & Becoming: Ars Memoria (2022-23 [2023], More Is More): [bc]: B+(***)
• Kate Gentile: Find Letter X (2021-23 [2023], Pi): [dl]: B+(***)
• Terry Gibbs Legacy Band: The Terry Gibbs Songbook (2022 [2023], Whaling City Sound): [sp]: B+(***)
• Frode Gjerstad With Matthew Shipp: We Speak (2022 [2023], Relative Pitch): [sp]: B+(**)
• Rich Halley Quartet: Fire Within (2023, Pine Eagle): [cd]: A-
• Matthew Halsall: An Ever Changing View (2023, Gondwana): [sp]: B+(**)
• Scott Hamilton Quartet: At PizzaExpress Live: In London (2022 [2023], PX): [sp]: B+(***)
• Eirik Hegdal/Jeff Parker/Ingebrigt Håker Flaten/Øyvind Skarbø: Superless (2022 [2023], Øyvind Jazzforum): [sp]: B+(***)
• Henry Hey: Trio: Ri-Metos (2023, self-released): [dl]: B+(***)
• Homeboy Sandman: I Can't Sell These Either (2023, self-released): [bc]: A-
• Jon-Erik Kellso and the EarRegulars: Live at the Ear Inn (2023, Arbors): [sp]: B+(***)
• Snorre Kirk: Top Dog (2021 [2023], Stunt): [sp]: B+(***)
• Location Location Location [Michael Formanek/Anthony Pirog/Mike Pride]: Damaged Goods (2023, Cuneiform): [dl]: B+(*)
• Harold López-Nussa: Timba a la Americana (2023, Blue Note): [sp]: B+(**)
• John Paul McGee: A Gospejazzical Christmas (2023, Jazz Urbano): [cd]: B
• Thandi Ntuli With Carlos Niño: Rainbow Revisited (2023, International Anthem): [sp]: B+(**)
• Øyvindland Med Eirik Hegdal & Erik Johannessen: Nonett (2021 [2023], Øra Fonogram): [sp]: B+(***)
• Engin Ozsahin: Conversations in Chaos (2023, self-released): [sp]: B+(**)
• Robert Prester & Adriana Samargia: Quenara (2023 [2024], Commonwealth Ave. Productions): [cd]: B+(*) [01-19]
• Quartet San Francisco/Gordon Goodwin's Big Phat Band/Take Six: Raymond Scott Reimagined (2023, ViolinJazz): [sp]: B+(***)
• Red Hot + Ra: Solar [Sun Ra in Brasil] (2023, Red Hot Org): [sp]: B+(***)
• Red Hot + Ra: Nuclear War: A Tribute to Sun Ra Volume 1 (2023, Red Hot Org): [sp]: B+(**)
• Ernesto Rodrigues/João Madeira/Hernâni Faustino: No Strings Attached (2023, Creative Sources): [bc]: B+(**)
• Sam Ross: Live at the Mira Room, Vol. II (2023, self-released): [cd]: B+(**)
• Andreas Røysum Ensemble: Mysterier (2022 [2023], Motvind): [sp]: B+(**)
• John Scofield: Uncle John's Band (2022 [2023], ECM): [sp]: B+(**)
• Elijah Shiffer: Star Jelly (2021 [2023], self-released): [bc]: A-
• Elijah Shiffer: City of Birds: Volume 1 (2023, self-released): [sp]: B+(***)
• Apostolos Sideris: Past-Presented (2023, Parallel): [bc]: B+(*)
• Speakers Corner Quartet: Further Out Than the Edge (2023, OTIH): [sp]: B+(**)
• Jason Stein/Damon Smith/Adam Shead: Hum (2022 [2023], Irritable Mystic): [bc]: B+(**)
• Elias Stemeseder/Christian Lillinger: Penumbra (2021 [2022], Plaist): [sp]: B+(**)
• Adrian Younge & Ali Shaheed Muhammad: Jazz Is Dead 17: Lonnie Liston Smith (2023, Jazz Is Dead): [sp]: B+(*)
• Dhafer Youssef: Street of Minarets (2023, Back Beat Edition): [sp]: B+(**)

Recent reissues, compilations, and vault discoveries:

• Chantal Acda & Bill Frisell: Live at Jazz Middelheim (2017 [2023], self-released): [sp]: B+(*)
• Johnny Griffin: Live at Ronnie Scott's (1964 [2023], Gearbox): [sp]: B+(***)
• Alon Nechushtan: For Those Who Cross the Seas (2006 [2023], ESP-Disk, 2CD): [cd]: A-

Old music:

• Peter Evans/Joel Ross/Nick Jozwlak/Savannah Harris: Being & Becoming (2019 [2020], More Is More): [bc]: A-
• Elijah Shiffer and the Robber Crabs: Unhinged (2017 [2018], self-released): [bc]: A-

Limited Sampling: Records I played parts of, but not enough to grade: -- means no interest, - not bad but not a prospect, + some chance, ++ likely prospect.

• Kate Gentile/International Contemporary Ensemble: B i o m e i.i (2022 [2023], Obliquity): [yt]: +

Grade (or other) changes:

• Irreversible Entanglements: Protect Your Light (2023, Impulse!): [cd]: [was: A-] A
• Steve Lehman/Orchestre National de Jazz: Ex Machina (2023, Pi): [cd]: [was: A-] A

Unpacking: Found in the mail last week:

None.

Speaking of Which

Blog link.

I started collecting this on Tuesday, mostly because I didn't want to let the Stevenson piece go without comment. The Mishra, which could still use some work, was also found in the Wichita Eagle that day. I had much more to write about the Ryu Spaeth piece, only some of which got tacked onto the footer section. Two points would have fit only awkwardly, but let me take a brief stab at them here:

1. Most leftists are informed and defined by a core philosophical principle -- that all people are fundamentally equal, and justice demands that they be respected as such -- but the left isn't some sort of religion or cult; it is a political tendency, effectively a party, aiming to incrementally improving justice by recognizing our fundamental equality. People who embrace this core principle will join the left, but you don't have to adopt the right thinking to align with the left. All you need is to find that your interests would be better served by the advance of the left. That happens a lot, especially with oppressed minorities. A bunch of things follow from this (which I'd rather not have to spell out at the moment -- one of which is that Jews in America, where there is risk of oppression, gravitate left, whereas in Israel, where they have attained the power to oppress others, they trend to the right).

2. Most leftists in America have come to embrace nonviolence, partly because we have come to realize that violence corrodes the spirit and compounds the difficulties of furthering justice, but also because it's more promising in our political system, which in principle allows for popular reform -- even though the system is heavily stacked against it. It is therefore tempting to raise nonviolence as a moral absolute, to condemn all exceptions, and to purge the left political movement of those who fall short of our ideals. I am pretty close to being an absolute pacifist, but even I have to admit that this would be self-defeating.

   Several reasons: violence, especially in self-defense, is a universal human instinct, one we may disapprove of and often regret, but cannot totally deny, because in some circumstances it seems like the only option for saving our humanity; throughout most history, at least since the left became a distinct political force, the only way change toward greater equality and justice could be achieved was through violence (e.g., the great revolutions from 1776 to 1917); even where reforms have been achieved, they were often conceded to hold back the threat of revolutionary violence. Of course, we now more fully realize that our violence has a dark side. But aren't there still situations where nonviolent change is so completely closed off that only through violence can people assert their humanity?

I don't think that we, in neurotic but still fundamentally liberal America, can with certainty assert that people barely surviving in Gaza have any real, viable options. Sure, one may still hope that nonviolent means, like BDS, might persuade Israel to lessen its stifling grip over its Palestinian subjects, but it may be that all the nonviolent protest has achieved -- and it has been tried at least as often as violence -- has been to reaffirm the faith of right-wing Israelis that overwhelming force will always prevail. Even before the rise of Smotrich and Ben-Gvir, but accelerating at an alarming rate after they joined the Netanyahu government, West Bank settlers had moved beyond their initial goal of staking claim to land to terrorizing Palestinians, hoping to drive them into exile. Israel's support for Azerbaijan's "ethnic cleansing" of Nagorno-Karabakh sure looked like a dress rehearsal for Israel driving Palestinians out of the West Bank.

While I personally believed that the revolt of Oct. 7 was ill-considered, politically reckless, and morally hazardous, their political and moral struggle was not mine to dictate or to judge. So I saw no point in condemning what appeared to be an act of desperation. Certainly not to make myself feel more righteous in comparison. Even less so as it would lend comfort to those who would take this act of violence and use as excuse to strike back even harder. And that part took no imagination on my part, as by the time I had heard the news, many Israelis were already clamoring for massive revenge -- as could have been expected, given that Israel's whole system of governing is based on their capacity for inflicting overwhelming violence.

Similarly, I can hardly condemn Israelis for defending themselves once the revolt broke out of Gaza. I would only point out that the defense was complete, and should have ended, once the attackers were rebuffed, and the border secured -- which happened within 24 hours of the initial attacks. The war since then, including some 40,000 tons of bombs Israel has dropped on Gaza, cannot be considered self-defense. This bombardment is no less than an act of systematic destruction and slaughter, an act that can only be summed up in the word "genocide."

Israelis have disputed that word, but with independence in 1948 they established a formal caste system with distinct legal status for Jews and Arabs, driving some 700,000 of the latter into exile, expropriating their property, and forbidding their return. They've also, building on the British model, regularly practiced collective punishment, including indiscriminate killing. Those are two of the three essential constituents of genocide. The third is the loss of inhibition against killing, which has been happening continuously since the 2000 Intifada and the 2006 loss of Gaza to Hamas, such that the Oct. 7 revolt merely tipped the impulse into action, with public statements to match. It is still possible that Israel's leaders will come to second thoughts and rein their killing in, but until they do, shying away from the term only encourages them to proceed.

Much more I could write on this, but time to post on schedule is running out.

Top story threads:

Israel: If you are at all unclear on how we got to the revolt on Oct. 7 and the subsequent intensification of the Israeli war against Gaza, start with this timeline: Countdown to genocide: the year before October 7.

• Mondoweiss:

  • [11-20] Day 45: Israeli military besieges the last functioning hospital in northern Gaza.

  • [11-21] Day 46: Israeli tanks besiege Indonesian Hospital as bombardment of Gaza continues.

  • [11-22] Day 47: Israel and Hamas agree to a temporary truce, release captives and prisoners.

  • [11-23] Day 48: Ahead of temporary ceasefire, Israeli forces continue to terrorize hospitals.

  • [11-24] Day 49: Four-day truce begins in Gaza after a night of heavy bombardment.

  • [11-25] Day 50: First Israeli and Palestinian hostages released as Gaza takes stock of devastation.

  • [11-26] Day 51: Israel fires at Palestinians attempting to return to northern Gaza amid shaky truce. The latter point is especially significant, as well as "Israeli forces prevent any scenes of celebration of the released prisoners in Jerusalem." Israel's leaders were not just very reluctant to agree to any sort of "pause," they are embarrassed that they did, and horrified that anyone might treat their compromise as any sign of weakness.

• Ghada Ageel: [11-25] While the world has abandoned Gaza, its doctors have done the opposite. They are our heroes.

• Michael Arria: [11-26] Three Palestinian students shot in Vermont in apparent hate crime.

• Erin Banco/Nahal Toosi: [11-21] US has sent Israel data on aid group locations to try to prevent strikes: Which didn't exactly work, or did it?

• Zack Beauchamp: [11-22] The Israel-Hamas deal is not a real ceasefire.

• Roger Cohen: [11-20] Between Israelis and Palestinians, a lethal psychological chasm grows: This "chasm" is real, but its symmetry is forced. One side has immensely more power than the other to punish and/or to forgive, and as such has responsibility for perpetuating the hostility.

• Dave DeCamp: [11-22] Biden admin worries the pause in Gaza will give journalists more access to expose Israeli atrocities.

• Richard Falk: [11-24] When is 'a humanitarian pause' genocidal?

• Abdallah Fayyad: [11-22] Why Israel imprisons so many Palestinians: "150 Palestinian prisoners are being released as part of Israel and Hamas's recent hostage deal. But thousands more remain behind bars."

• Joshua Frank: [11-19] The dangers only multiply: "Could Israel's war on Gaza go nuclear?" No surprise that at least one of Israel's more sociopathic politicians suggested that it should, but common sense argues that it won't: mostly because the target is too close to risk the nuclear fallout. On the other hand, it's sobering to read this line: "Indeed, well over 25,000 tons of bombs had already been dropped on Gaza by early November, the equivalent of two Hiroshima-style nukes (without the radiation)." One thing that's not stopping Israel is scruples about genocide.

• Sophia Goodfriend: [11-24] Israel's 'thought police' law ramps up dangers for Palestinian social media users. The amendment was first drafted a year-and-a-half ago, but only passed in the current panic.

• Jonathan Guyer: [11-22] The Israel-Hamas hostage deal, explained: "This is a deal that has essentially been on the table for about a month," i.e., well before Israel's ground offensive.

• Tareq S Hajjaj: [11-25] A 'temporary ceasefire' means realizing how much we've lost.

• Sam Hamad: [11-18] Understanding Hasbara: Israel's propaganda machine.

• Benjamin Hart: [11-22] How long could the Israel-Hamas ceasefire last? Interview with Gershon Baskin ("an Israeli peace activist who played a key role in the freeing of Gilad Shalit" in 2006), who plainly states: "There is no scenario where the war ends with Hamas in control of Gaza."

• Ellen Ioanes: [11-24] The controversial phrase "from the river to the sea," explained.

• Amira Jarmakani: [11-20] The ADL is leading the attack against free speech on Palestine.

• Caitlin Johnstone: [11-13] Israelis keep hurting their own PR interests by talking.

• Fred Kaplan: [11-22] One factor behind the Gaza cease-fire deal: A massive shift in the US relationship with Israel.

• Kathy Kelly: [11-24] Tunnels for safety and tunnels for death.

• Jen Kirby: [11-22] How Qatar became a key broker in the Israel-Hamas deal.

• Daniel Larison: [11-22] The warfare of starvation: "The siege will kill Palestinian civilians and by doing nothing, the US is supporting it."

• Lauren Leatherby: [11-25] Gaza civilians, under Israeli barrage, are being killed at historic pace: "In less than two months, more than twice as many women and children have been reported killed in Gaza than in Ukraine after two years of war." Also see the Corey Robin tweets, below.

• John Mueller: [11-21] What if Israel didn't set out to 'destroy Hamas'? "The case for a limited response after the October 7 attacks."

• Orly Noy: [11-23] What Israelis won't be asking about the Palestinians released for hostages: "The list of Palestinians slated to be exchanged for Israelis should provoke reflection over the role of mass imprisonment in the occupation."

• Taha Ozhan: [11-25] The West will pay a heavy price for expending its credibility on Israel.

• Matthew Petti: [11-20] Media amplified US, Israeli narrative on Palestinian deaths: "Following senior officials' lead, many prominent Western news outlets started linking Hamas to hospitals in Gaza."

• Mitchell Plitnick: [11-24] Israel wants to pull the U.S. into a regional confrontation, but Biden remains reluctant.

• Mouin Rabbani: Two pieces that Norman Finkelstein published: [11-26] Thoughts on the truce; and Israel has lost the plot: This provides a cogent explanation of why "the elimination of Hamas is unattainable" -- not exactly the one I was thinking of, but good enough for all practical purposes. Given that the root-and-branch elimination of Hamas is doomed to failure, serious thought should be given to how to turn Hamas into a force for reform: basically, how to domesticate it. Israel has long complained about not having a "partner for peace," but Israel never wanted one (else they would have made an effort). Also see this [11-07] discussion between Rabbani and Finkelstein: Gaza one month later.

• Mohannad Sabry: [11-22] Israel's killing of journalists and denial can't hide the horrific toll in Gaza.

• Richard Silverstein:

  • [11-20] Former IDF commander calls for Gaza genocide: "Maj. Gen. Giora Eiland argues inflicting disease and starvation will hasten Gaza's surrender."

  • [11-21] Friendly-fire incidents killed 10 IDF officers, wounded dozens of others, killed many civilians: "Israeli drones and helicopters killed Israeli hostages as Hannibal Directive was invoked."

  • [11-24] Amalek: 'Erasing' Gaza.

• Tom Suarez: [11-26] The masterful propaganda of 'deadliest day for Jews since the Holocaust': "Israel and its supporters are engaging in Holocaust revisionism to justify its genocidal attack on Gaza."

• Jeffrey St Clair:

  • [11-25] Complete and utter carnage: "The Scourging of Gaza: Diary of a genocidal war." Too bad this is paywalled, leaving free riders with another St Clair reprint (see Rebirth of a Nation: US history according to DW Griffith).

  • [11-18] Enter the moral abyss: The previous week's entry in "The Scourging of Gaza: Diary of a genocidal war."

• Struan Stevenson: [11-20] Iran's 'axis of resistance' to Israel begins to crack. Author is a former member of the European Parliament (from Scotland), and a former chairman of a group called Friends of a Free Iran. This piece, like his previous [10-17] Iran's tyrannical mullahs created the Hamas monster, is vivid and vitriolic propaganda aimed at pinning the Oct. 7 Gaza revolt on Iran, for reasons known only to the diabolical mullahs. Much of what Stevenson writes is patently false, and much more is simply hard to believe. Iran didn't invent Hamas, and had essentially no interest in the Palestinian struggle until the 1990s, when Israel turned on Iran, figuring that Iraq could no longer be painted as an existential threat, and that Iran would play better with the Americans, who still nursed a grudge over the 1980 hostage thing. Even so, there's no credible accounting of how much support Iran has ever provided to Hamas. Stevenson's claim that "the mullahs have provided hundreds of millions of dollars annually to Hamas" is especially mind-boggling. (That's more like the levels of arms the US supplies to Ukraine and Israel.) Even if Iran is using its "proxies" just to stir up trouble, it would be much easier and cheaper to negotiate some kind of détente, or better still a normalization of relations, which would allow them (and others) the opportunity to enjoy peace, instead of just beating them with sticks like like Mojahedin-e Khalq (the Israel-supported terrorist group Stevenson is allied with).

• Philip Weiss: [11-26] Weekly Briefing: The Israeli perspective -- on genocide -- dominates our airwaves.

• Oren Ziv/Yotam Ronen: [11-22] Carrying the pain of loss on October 7, these families are pleading for peace: That the families of hostages have been the loudest and most visible opponents of the war against Gaza reflects, I think, two deeper truths. One is that sympathy gives them a forum to speak publicly where most Israelis (and all Palestinians) are intimidated into silence. The other is that they realize that Israel will gain nothing by prosecuting the war, while they stand to lose their families for no good reason.

Trump, and other Republicans:

• Thomas B Edsall: [11-22] The roots of Trump's rage.

• Margaret Hartmann:

  • [11-20] Trump is still obsessed with the 'golden showers' rumor.

  • [11-22] Trump posted 19 videos in a row on Truth Social in a cry for help.

• Eric Levitz: [11-24] Trump as a plan for massively increasing inflation. Clever to note that while Republicans hammer away at Biden for inflation -- when he wasn't threatening to beat up Teamsters, Markwayne Mullin was lying about diesel prices (see [11-22] GOP Senator swiftly fact-checked after whining about gas prices for his massive truck) -- aren't solutions, and in many ways only make the problem worse. Still I'm not convinced that Trump's 10% across-the-board tariff idea is such a bad one: true it will raise consumer prices, and it may not stimulate much new domestic production, but it should reduce the trade deficit (which I've long taken to be a bad thing, although economists tend to argue otherwise). I also doubt that another round of Trump tax cuts will have much effect on consumer price inflation -- although it will undoubtedly lead to inflated asset values (something economists refuse to count as inflation). On the other hand, no mention here of antitrust (which Trump will presumably cripple, unless he can use it vindictively to attack his political enemies), which if enforced should push prices down, and if neglected will allow companies to become more predatory. Or of more deregulation, which helps unscrupulous companies increas profits both through higher prices and by passing costs on to the public (pollution, which includes the effects of global warming, is the most famous of these externalities). Still, Republicans do have one effective tool to quell inflation: recession. That's cure much worse than the disease it claims to treat. It's also the end-state of the last three Republican presidencies. Whereas this and the last two Democratic presidents (but not Carter) ended up with sustained economic growth, and (more modest) wage growth. Maybe a little inflation isn't such a bad thing.

• Zachary Petrizzo: [11-16] Trumpworld is already at war over staffing a new Trump White House.

• Roger Sollenberger:

  • [11-24] The secret megadonor behind the MAGA movement's 'nerve center': About Mark Rydin.

  • [11-22] Conservative group accidentally reveals its secret donors. Some of them are liberal orgs. The group is American Compass. The two orgs with a "liberal history" are Omidyar Network and the Hewlett Foundation, both founded by tech moguls.

• Peter Wade: [11-26] Christie blames Trump for increasing antisemitism and Islamophobia: To quote him: "Intolerance toward anyone encourages intolerance toward everyone."

Biden and/or the Democrats:

• Branko Marcetic: [11-22] Voters are leaving Joe Biden in droves over his support for Israel.

• Harold Meyerson: [11-20] Can Biden and the Democrats survive their divisions on Israel-Palestine? He offers some suggestions, mostly referring back to the 1968 rift over the Vietnam war, which isn't terribly relevant. Johnson's big liability in 1968 was that he and his administration had repeatedly lied about the war, falling way short of their promises, inspiring no confidence in their future, in a war that had enormous personal impact on millions of Americans. Consequently, Johnson/Humphrey were opposed by prominent Democrats. On the other hand, no major Democrat is going to stand up against Biden, especially not for showing excessive fealty to Israel. Maybe there's an enthusiasm slump as the gap between the Democratic Party leadership and base expands, but party regulars are almost certain to rally against Trump. The volatile center, on the other hand, may not be able to articulate the problem with Biden's wars in Ukraine, Gaza, and (heaven forbid) Taiwan, but the bad vibes could sink him.

• Steven Shepard: [11-25] The polls keep getting worse for Biden.

Tweet from Daniel Denvir on points above:

If Democrats are suddenly worried that Biden will lose to Trump -- as they should be -- the rational thing to do would be to 1) make another, more popular Dem the nominee and 2) move the party away from its pro-genocide position. Blaming the left for saying genocide is bad won't work

Also from Nathan J Robinson:

I'm interested in the theory of how Biden is supposed to turn his numbers around, given that:
(1) The main issue is his age and he gets older every day, and
(2) Humanitarian crisis in Gaza will worsen as disease and starvation set in, and it is causing young Dems to hate him

Legal matters and other crimes:

• Ian Millhiser: [11-21] A Supreme Court case about stocks could help make Trump's authoritarian dreams reality: "The 'unitary executive' is back, and it could supercharge Trump's plans to fill the government with his own loyalists."

Economic matters:

• David Dayen: [11-20] How Larry Summers's bad predictions hurt the planet.

• Emily Stewart: [11-20] Wages are rising. Jobs are plentiful. Nobody's happy. "It's a good time to be a worker and a bad time to be a consumer -- the problem is most people are both."

Ukraine War:

• Sophia Ampgkarian: [11-23] Why US-led sanctions on Russia are a failure: "After nearly two years of the tightest embargoes ever, Moscow's economy and war effort are doing far better than anticipated."

• Robert English: [11-24] Bad history makes for bad policy on Ukraine.

• Edward Hunt: [11-21] The Ukraine war has been a 'great bargain' for US in the Black Sea.

Around the world:

• Victor Grossman: [11-24] Split on the left in Germany.

• Eldar Mamedov: [11-22] On foreign policy, Argentina's Milei leans neocon, not libertarian: Notably, he's a "staunch supporter of Ukraine," has a "fervid embrace of Israel," is opposed to Argentina joining BRICS.

• Muhammad Sahimi: [11-24] Iran's political factions aren't united on Hamas, or the Middle East: "But most favor a policy of restraint in reaction to the Gaza war."

• Helmer Stoel: [11-24] Far-right Geert Wilders won the Dutch election because the establishment indulged him.

Other stories:

Ryan Cooper:

• [10-11] The cooperative that could: "How S Group became Finland's most dominant retailer." Pull quotes include: "S Group's business model depends in part on the perception that being a member benefits broader society."

• [11-20] Nefarious corporate overlord accidentally kick-starts media company: "Gamurs Group fired the editor in chief of The Escapist. Most of the publication joined him to start something new, a worker cooperative called Second Wind."

Eileen Crist/Judith Lipton/David Barash: [11-24] End the insanity: For nuclear disarmament and global demilitarization.

Tom Engelhardt: [11-26] A slow-motion Gaza: But isn't it a little soon to turn "Gaza" into a metaphor for the "hell on Earth" that global warming is inching towards?

James Fallows: [11-23] Why Charlie Peters matters: The founder and editor-in-chief of Washington Monthly for 30 years (1969-2000) has died, at 96. I subscribed to the journal for several years early on, possibly from its inception, and found it to be seriously informative and generally sensible about policy workings in Washington. I was rather dismayed later on to find that Peters had coined the "neoliberal" term, though there may be an argument that what Peters had in mind differed significantly from the disparaging use of the term lately -- see Paul Glastris: [01-08] Need a new economic vision? Gotcha covered. Last thing I recall reading by Peters was a sad lament about his home state of West Virginia flipping Republican.

Eric Levitz: [11-22] OpenAI was never going to save us from the robot apocalypse.

Robert Lipsyte: [11-21] Farewell to the New York Times sports department: "Or should it be good riddance?"

Pankaj Mishra: [11-18] The west never had a chance at winning over the world: Talks about the phrase "the global south," and how it's come to the fore since Russia's invasion of Ukraine tightened the bond between the US and Europe, while estranging both from the rest of the world (now known as, the Global South). It surely can't be a surprise that the renewed and militant union of Europe and the US (aka, the West) would be viewed suspiciously by the Global South? Mishra notes that "the Biden administration failed to enlist any major country of the Global South in its cause," i.e., economic war against Russia, ostensibly to defend Ukraine. He adds: "Even worse, the conflict in Gaza may now have mortally damaged Western power and credibility in the Global South."

Olivia Nuzzi: [11-22] The mind-bending politics of RFK Jr.'s spoiler campaign. He's having a moment as a free agent presidential candidate, partly because he might appeal to scattered, disaffected groups that otherwise are stuck in the two-party straitjacket; possibly also on the 60th anniversary of the assassination that turned his family into a cult memory project. Most of his appeal will probably blow over, because the one group he has no appeal for is moderate-tempered centrists. That leaves extremists who hate both parties, and who don't care who wins. How many of them are there really?

However, note that a recent a recent Harvard/Harris Poll, which shows Trump over Biden by 6% in a two-way matchup, gives Kennedy 21% of the vote in a three-way, increasing Biden's deficit to 8%. In a five-way with West (3%) and Stein (2%), Trump loses 1%, Biden loses 2%, Kennedy 3%. St Clair (link above) comments: "If your Lesser Evil countenances the bombing of hospitals and the slaughter of nearly 6000 children in a few weeks, don't you know that you can count me out."

Andrew O'Hehir: [11-26] My mother, the debutante Communist: An American family story of love, loss and J. Edgar Hoover.

Nathan J Robinson: [11-21] Can the left reclaim "security"? A review of Astra Taylor's new book, The Age of Insecurity.

Douglas Rushkoff: [11-25] 'We will coup whoever we want!': The unbearable hubris of Musk and the billionaire tech bros. Reviews some books, starting with Walter Isaacson's Musk.

Anya Schiffrin: [10-13] Fixing disinformation online: "What will it take to regulate the abuses of Big Tech without undermining free speech?"

Katharine Q Seelye: [11-19] Rosalyn Carter, first lady and a political partner, dies at 96: I don't really have anything to say about her, good or bad, but thought I should note her passing in the plainest way possible. While trawling through the NY Times obituaries, I also noticed:

• George Brown, drummer with Kool & the Gang
• A.S. Byatt, scholar who found literary fame with fiction
• Bob Contant, bohemian booksetter [a founder of St Mark's Bookshop]
• Herbert Gold, postwar novelist of love and marriage
• Joan Jara, who found justice for husband slain after coup
• Evelyn Fox Keller, who turned a feminist lens on science
• Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie, who looked at history from the bottom up
• Charles Peters, Founder of The Washington Monthly

I was surprised not to find an obituary there for the late photographer Larry Fink (82, Mar. 11, 1941-Nov. 25). For some images, start here.

Ryu Spaeth: [11-20] Israel, Gaza, and the fracturing of the intellectual left. Title makes this seem like a big deal, but it's really just comes down to a couple pieces in Dissent between Joshua Leifer and Gabriel Winant, with side glances to a couple more journals (n+1, Jewish Currents). This sort of thing happens every now and then, usually when someone who has long identified with the left freaks out and turns on his former comrades. Back in 1967, I used to read a journal called The Minority of One, which was very strongly opposed to the American war in Vietnam . . . until June 1967, when the editor flipped to support Israel in its Six-Day War, and forgot about everything else. Something similar happened with Paul Berman after 9/11. There have been other cases of leftists turning hard right, but these two (presumably Leifer, too) insisted that they were being consistent, and others in the left had gone haywire. They created some noise, but had little if any impact on the left, which always recovered with a principled examination of the facts.

This article quotes Arielle Angel (Jewish Currents): "What we are watching is a full reactionary moment among many Jews, even some left-wing Jews, because they feel there was no space on the left for their grief." That doesn't seem like too much to ask. The left is fueled by indignity over injustice, and injustice is often first experienced as grief. But few on the left would grant anyone, even Jews (whose suffering has left an indelible mark on most Euroamerican leftists), an exclusive right to grieve, let alone a license to channel that grief into a force that strikes out at and inflicts grief on others.

Most of us realized immediately that's exactly what Israel's leaders had in mind. They saw the Oct. 7 revolt not as a tragic human loss but as an affront to their power, and they immediately moved to reassert their power, with scarcely any regard for more human losses (even on their own side). Over six weeks later, as threats of genocide were turned into practice, we need hardly debate that point.

Glenn Thrush/Serge F Kovaleski: [11-25] Stabbing of Derek Chauvin raises questions about inmate safety. Weren't there already questions? If not, why do police interrogators brag about how treacherous life in prison will be?

Jen Wieczner: [11-22] Behold the utter destruction of crypto's biggest names.

Here are a series of tweets from Corey Robin (I'm copying them down because the original format is so annoying; the chart matches the Leatherby piece above, so that is probably the uncited source here):

1/ "Israel's assault is different. Experts say that even a conservative reading of the casualty figures reported from Gaza show that the pace of death during Israel's campaign has few precedents in this century.

2/ "Conflict-casualty experts have been taken aback at just how many people have been reported killed in Gaza -- most of them women and children -- and how rapidly. It is not just the unrelenting scale of the strikes . . . It is also the nature of the weaponry itself.

3/"'It's beyond anything that I've seen in my career,' said Marc Garlasco, a former senior intelligence analyst at the Pentagon. To find a historical comparison for so many large bombs in such a small area, he said, we may 'have to go back to Vietnam, or the Second World War.'

4/ "Modern international laws of war were developed largely in response to the atrocities of World War II."

The comments range from stupid to facetious ("It is morally appalling that Hamas decided to start a war with a country that can mount such a powerful air assault, . . . All those tunnels & not one bomb shelter").

Corey also offered a tweet on the Ryu Spaeth article I wrote too much (but not enough) about above:

Everyone's pissed about this piece but I think it has two virtues. 1) It gives a fair, full hearing to the anti-Zionist side. 2) It reveals, inadvertently, the extent to which Zionist progressives depend on debates from 100 years ago. I'll take the win.

One more point I might as well make here, as I didn't consider it appropriate above, is that this article is only of interest to those on the left who are in close proximity to people with a deep psychic identity connection to the very old Zionist left (the romance of the kibbutzim) and/or the trauma of the Holocaust. The Oct. 7 attack hit these people so hard that they suspended their critical facilities, losing track of the context, and therefore unable to foresee the consequences.

Most of us immediately recognized the context that led to the revolt, and understood that the response of Israel's leaders would be genocidal. Hence, no matter how much we may or may not have grieved for the immediate victims of the revolt, we understood that their deaths would soon be dwarfed by Israel's vindictive reassertion of their overwhelming power.

It's worth noting that while such reactions are unusual on the American left, they are very common in Israel. The best example is the long-running Peace Now bloc, which formed after the 1982 war on Lebanon went sour. Ever since then, they have never failed to support initial Israeli military outbursts (e.g., 2006 in Gaza and Lebanon, and the many subsequent Operations in Gaza), although they've almost always come to regret those wars. Israelis, even ones with liberal and/or socialist temperaments, are conditioned to rally under crisis to support the state's warriors, and the national security state pulls their triggers whenever they want to strike out. It's practically an involuntary reflex, even among people who must know better.

It's great credit to Jewish Voice for Peace that they didn't fall for this triggering.

Regarding Larry Fink, I posted the following comment on Facebook:

I met Larry several times. Longest talk we had was mostly about jazz, in the car on the way to a memorial "meeting" for his mother. He took a lot of notable photographs of jazz musicians. Liz had one framed, of Billie Holiday and Ella Fitzgerald sitting together in a table in a club somewhere. On 9/11, he called Liz, and told her he was thinking about rounding up some fowl for a "chickens come home to roost" photo, echoing the famous Malcolm X quote. He was living on a farm in PA at the time, but I don't recall whether he had his own chickens, or whether he ever took that photo. But of the myriad reactions to 9/11, his was one of the smartest. (Or maybe I thought so because I was already thinking about the same quote.)

Daily Log

Responding to a comment about dwindling promo CDs, I took a quick look at my tracking files. What I found was:

2023. 295
2022. 310
2021. 287
2020. 245
2019. 311
2018. 338
2017. 419
2016. 478
2015. 504
2014. 493

Music Week

Expanded blog post, November archive (in progress).

Tweet: Music Week: 50 albums, 8 A-list

Music: Current count 41210 [41160] rated (+50), 9 [22] unrated (-13).

Another Speaking of Which last night. I didn't have much time to work to search out stories, even less to annotate them, but did manage a couple hours for yet another iteration of my appropriately, I would say, simple-minded solution to the Israel's war on Gaza. It's just that simple: stop it. If you don't, you'll ultimately wind up inflicting so much self-damage you won't care how much hurt you inflicted on others.

Little chance of this being recognized by the people in power, who are so smitten by the notion that all their problems can be solved by force. They're wrong. But they are capable of doing immense harm in their flailing and thrashing.

On Wednesday, I sent out an initial round of 205 invitations to cast ballots in the 18th Annual Francis Davis Jazz Critics Poll. I've sent 15-20 more invitations out since then, and will send out a few more over the next week or two. Deadline is December 15. I'm pleased with the results so far, including 14 ballots submitted, and another 60 commitments to vote.

One of the perks of running the Poll is that I get tips on lots of new albums I hadn't heard (or in many cases even heard of). I add these to my tracking file (currently 1046 jazz albums, 1255 non-jazz). You can see a number of them already below, and I suspect that new ones will be most of what I listen to in the coming month. So far 182 records have received votes. I've added the ones I haven't heard (59 music albums + 10 old, so 38% of total) to my EOY Jazz List (scroll down to the 2% note).

Of course, there's also an EOY Non-Jazz List. I've done virtually no recent prospecting for non-jazz records, as I'm trying hard to finish off my 2023 promo queue, as well as keep up with jazz ballot picks. Consequently, it's lagged more than usual (especially more than last year). That will probably change if/when I start collecting EOY lists. At the moment, that seems like a really insane thing to contemplate, but I've described it as "my favorite waste of time," so if some time opens up, I'm more likely to waste it than I am to write some magnum opus on why US foreign policy is totally bankrupt. Let alone one on 2024 elections, as I've fallen into the 20% of Democrats who no longer smile on Biden. (If you doubt why, you obviously haven't been reading lately. Go back to yesterday's link to Biden's op-ed, which most likely his aides told him is today's match for JFK's "Ich bin ein Berliner" speech.)

Two new books under the "Recent Reading" widget. I enjoyed Christopher Clark's Revolutionary Spring so much I decided to read a bit more about 1848, something a bit more about the revolutions that didn't happen, hence China Miéville's book on The Communist Manifesto. It turned out to be more on the text, and less on the history, than I wanted, but still left me with warm and fuzzy feelings for my own flirtation with the red side. It also reminded me that not so long ago, no one could conceive of radical change -- something a great many saw urgent need for -- coming about without violence.

After Viet Thanh Nguyen got banned from the 92nd St. Y for signing a petition calling for a cease-fire in Gaza, I saw an interview with him, and got interested in his new memoir. Then I noticed Nothing Ever Dies: Vietnam and the Memory of War, and figured I should read that one first. Just started it, and I'm already finding things I'd like to share. I've written quite a bit about his subject -- not specifically on Vietnam, but you need only check my birth certificate to see that as the pivotal event in my life.

I ordered two more books. One, mentioned at the end of yesterday's post, is Norman Finkelstein's Gaza: An Inquest Into Its Martyrdom, which seems almost quaint now, given how much more devastating Israel's war against Gaza is now than the periodic assaults since 2006. However, as Nguyen should be among the first to point out, the extreme severity of the current genocide depends for its justification on forgetting everything that Israel did previously, lest the Oct. 7 revolt be viewed as anything other than unprovoked murderous frenzy.

The other book is the paperback reprint of Carlos Lozada's What Were We Thinking: A Brief Intellectual History of the Trump Era: a book of book reports, that looks like it might be a useful reference.

New records reviewed this week:

• Jason Adasiewicz: Roscoe Village: The Music of Roscoe Mitchell (2023, Corbett vs. Dempsey): [bc]: B+(**)
• Susan Alcorn/Septeto Del Sur: Canto (2023, Relative Pitch)
• Maria Baptist Quintet: Essays on Jazz (2023, self-released): [sp]: B+(***)
• John Bishop: Antwerp (2023, Origin): [cd]: B+(**)
• Brian Blade & the Fellowship Band: Kings Highway (2023, Stoner Hill): [sp]: B+(*)
• BlankFor.Ms/Jason Moran/Marcus Gilmore: Refract (2023, Red Hook): [sp]: B+(***)
• Jane Bunnett and Maqueque: Playing With Fire (2023, True North/Linus Entertainment): [sp]: B+(*)
• Emmet Cohen: Master Legacy Series Volume 5: Featuring Houston Person (2023, Bandstand): [sp]: A-
• Sylvie Courvoisier: Chimaera (2022 [2023], Intakt): [sp]: A-
• Dry Thrust: The Less You Sleep (2020 [2023], Trost): [sp]: B+(*)
• Antoine Drye With Strings: Retreat to Beauty (Oblation Vol. 3: Providence!) (2021 [2023], Cellar Music): [sp]: B+(*)
• George Freeman: The Good Life (2022 [2023], HighNote): [sp]: B+(**)
• Eric Friedlander: She Sees (2023, Skipstone): [sp]: B+(*)
• George Gee Swing Orchestra: Winter Wonderland (2023, self-released): [cd]: B+(**)
• Grupo Frontera: El Comienzo (2023, VHR Music): [sp]: B+(**)
• Gabriel Guerrero & Quantum: Equilibrio (2019 [2023], Origin): [cd]: B+(**)
• David Ian: Vintage Christmas Trio Melody (2023, Prescott): [cd]: B
• I.P.A.: Grimsta (2022 [2023], Cuneiform): [dl]: B+(**)
• Val Jeanty/Candice Hoyes/Mimi Jones: Nite Bjuti (2022 [2023], Whirlwind): [sp]: B+(**)
• Hannah Marks: Outsider, Outlier (2022 [2023], Out of Your Head): [cd]: B+(*)
• Sarah McKenzie: Without You (2023, Normandy Lane Music): [cd]: B+(*)
• Hedvig Mollestad Weejuns: Weejuns (2022 [2023], Rune Grammofon): [r]: B+(***)
• Ivo Perelman/Matthew Shipp: Tryptych I (2022, SMP): [bc]: B+(***)
• Ivo Perelman/Matthew Shipp: Tryptych II (2022, SMP): [bc]: B+(**)
• Ivo Perelman/Matthew Shipp: Tryptych III (2022, SMP): [bc]: B+(***)
• Jason Roebke: Four Spheres (2022 [2023], Corbett vs. Dempsey): [bc]: B+(**)
• Dave Sewelson/Stephen Moses/Jochem van Dijk/Steve Holtje: Orca Uprising (2023, MechaBenzaiten): [bc]: B
• Russ Spiegel: Caribbean Blue (2023, Ruzztone Music): [cd]: B+(**)
• Trio Grande: Urban Myth (2023, Whirlwind): [cd]: B+(**)
• Trio San: Hibiki (2022 [2023], Jazzdor): [cd]: B+(***)
• Anna Webber/Matt Mitchell: Capacious Aeration (2023, Tzadik): [sp]: B+(**)
• Mars Williams/Vasco Trilla: Critical Mass (2021 [2023], Not Two): [sp]: B+(***)
• Joe Wittman: Trio Works (2023, self-released): [cd]: B+(**)
• Joe Wittman/Vito Dieterle/Jesse Breheney/Josh Davis: Night Out (2022 [2023], self-released): [bc]: B+(*)
• Miguel Zenón/Dan Tepfer: Internal Melodies (2023, Main Door Music): [sp]: B+(***)

Recent reissues, compilations, and vault discoveries:

• Fred Anderson: The Milwaukee Tapes, Vol. 2 (1980 [2023], Corbett vs. Dempsey): [bc]: B+(***)
• Graham Collier: Down Another Road @ Stockholm Jazz Days '69 (1969 [2023], My Only Desire): [sp]: A-
• Eric Ghost: Secret Sauce (1975 [2022], Jazz Room): [sp]: B+(***)
• Milford Graves With Arthur Doyle & Hugh Glover: Children of the Forest (1976 [2023], Black Editions Archive): [sp]: B+(***)
• Roy Hargrove: The Love Suite: In Mahogany (1993 [2023], Blue Engine): [sp]: A
• Ahmad Jamal: Emerald City Nights: Live at the Penthouse 1966-1968 (1966/68 [2023], Jazz Detective/Elemental, 2CD): [cd]: B+(***) [11-24]
• Paul Lytton/Erhard Hirt: Borne on a Whim: Duets, 1981 (1981 [2023], Corbett vs. Dempsey): [bc]: B+(**)
• Les McCann: Never a Dull Moment! Live From Coast to Coast 1966-1967 (1963-67 [2023], Resonance, 2CD): [cd]: A- [12-01]
• Wes Montgomery/Wynton Kelly Trio: Maximum Swing: The Unissued 1965 Half Note Recordings (1965 [2023], Resonance, 2CD): [cd]: B+(***) [12-01]
• Michel Petrucciani: The Montreux Years (1990-98 [2023], BMG/Montreux): [sp]: A-
• Cal Tjader: Catch the Groove: Live at the Penthouse 1963-1967 (1963-67 [2023], Jazz Detective/Elemental, 2CD): [cd]: A- [11-24]

Old music:

• Dexter Gordon Quartet: Bouncin' With Dex (1975 [1976], SteepleChase): [r]: A-
• Dexter Gordon Quartet: Stable Mabel (1975, SteepleChase): [r]: B+(***)
• Dexter Gordon Quartet: Cheese Cake (1964 [1979], SteepleChase): [r]: B+(**)
• Dexter Gordon Quartet: I Want More (1964 [1980], SteepleChase): [r]: B+(***)

Unpacking: Found in the mail last week:

• Andy Pratt: Trio (Thrift Girl) [01-12]
• Sam Ross: Live at the Mira Room, Vol. II (self-released) [11-03]

Speaking of Which

Blog link.

I'm mostly working on the Francis Davis Jazz Critics Poll this week, and probably every week until the first of January, so this weekly exercise is being demoted to a part-time, background project, making it even more cryptic and scattered than usual.

Still, let me say a few words up top -- or reiterate, as I've said pretty much the same thing in recent weeks. The main story is, again, Israel's war, which is no longer just against Gaza, but has extended to the West Bank and the border with Lebanon. Israel's leaders have always understood themselves to be at war with the Palestinian people and the broader Arab neighborhood, the purpose of which is to utterly dominate the region, reducing Palestinians to an "utterly defeated people," out of sight and out of mind, effectively dead. You can date their war back to 1948, or earlier. You can find seeds in Herzl's 1896 The Jewish State, which started growing in 1920 when Britain set up its "Jewish homeland," playing its typical divide-and-conquer game. But the idea is older still: at least since 1492, Europeans have moved to new lands and immediately started plotting to subjugate, or better still eliminate, the people they found there. So this first point, that the war did not start on October 7, should be too obvious to have to dwell on. Still, we may treat it as a new phase or level, as the shock of the Oct. 7 revolt gave Israel an excuse to implement the genocide that Zionism always implied.

The second point is that the Oct. 7 revolt, and the subsequent retaliation and escalation by Israel, was not necessary, and could easily have been prevented, at least by Israel's current and recent leaders. (Most obviously Netanyahu, but it's hard to discern any fundamental differences going back to, well, Ben-Gurion, with only Sharett and Rabin offering vague and conflicted gestures that might have pointed toward some form of peaceful co-existence.)

Israel -- by which I mean its political leaders, a group that could have fit within a meeting room and/or a conference call, and not the whole nation -- could simply have decided to contain the damage of Oct. 7, and not to compound the damage by retaliating. They didn't do so because they've locked themselves into a logic that tries to solve all problems by asserting their power. They may argue that their policies have worked well enough so far, so will work well enough in the future, but they are wrong: they've only appeared to have worked because they've never seriously assayed the costs.

The revolt itself could have been prevented in either of two ways. The specific people who organized and led the revolt -- for lack of more precise names, we might as well follow everyone else and call them Hamas, but we're talking about a small and isolated subset of people affiliated with Hamas, and quite probably others not in any way part of Hamas -- presumably had enough free will (but do we really know this?) to have decided not to act. That they did revolt suggests not malice so much as desperation, and mere luck in the outcome.

The other way to prevent revolt is to create conditions where Palestinians would have no compelling reason to revolt. There are lots of things that can be done in this regard (and Israel has even, on rare occasions, tried some, which worked as well as they could, as long as they were in place). Almost all internal conflicts end, or simply fade into oblivion, with some kind of accommodation. Israel is peculiarly, but not inevitably, resistant to the idea, but it's the only real path out of their quandry.

Given these percepts, I've laid out a fairly simple way to end the war in Gaza, which gives Israel a free hand to implement when they are ready, which is favorable enough to Israeli interests they should be happy to accept, and which accords Palestinians in Gaza a fair hope for respect and recovery. It does not attempt to solve any issues beyond the Gaza front, so does not require Israel to address its abuses of Palestinians within Israel and its other occupied territories, or its border issues with other countries. Very briefly, the steps are:

1. Israel withdraws its forces from Gaza, and ceases fire on Gaza, except for reserving the right to retaliate within a limited period of time (say, 12 hours) for any subsequent attack launched from Gaza. The sooner the better, but no one can/will force Israel to withdraw, so they can destroy as much as they can stomach, until they tire and/or become too embarrassed to continue.

2. Israel cedes its claim to Gaza, its air space, and adjacent sea, to the United Nations. The UN accepts, and sets up a temporary governing authority. (Israel may continue to conduct air and sea recognizance and interception until other arrangements are in place.) The UN authority will control the dispensation of aid, which will be allowed in only if all hostages are released and no resistance is offered.

3. There will be blanket amnesty for all Gazans, for all Israelis engaged with Gaza, and for the government of Israel, for all acts up to the cease fire date. Hamas and Islamic Jihad, and any other armed groups within Gaza, will cease to exist as organizations, and be banned from reforming. Individual members of those groups will be covered by the blanket amnesty. It is not necessary to disarm people, but a buy back program for arms and munitions would be a good idea.

4. The UN will issue passports for Gaza, which will allow residents to leave and return at any later date.

5. The UN will organize several levels of advisory councils, and operate subject to their agreement. The easiest way to organize these councils would be to select members at random, allowing anyone thus selected to select another person in their place. This will lead to elections in a year or two. In the meantime the UN will organize competent administration, police, and courts, primarily employing locals.

6. After a couple years, Gaza will be recognized as an independent country, with normal full sovereignty, and will be able to renegotiate its relations with the UN, and with any other countries. It should be understood that its borders are permanently defined, and that it cannot call itself Palestine (as that might imply extraterritorial ambitions).

Note that nothing here requires Israel to dismantle its apartheid regime elsewhere, nor does it protect Israel from war crime and human rights charges (except for Gaza up to the hand off). Nothing here keeps world from showing its reservations over Israel, especially through BDS programs. Israel will remain, for the time anyway, racist and militarist. It just won't have Gaza to kick around any more. Given how much kicking they've done, especially since 2006, that in itself should reduce the conflict, and make other aspects of it easier to deal with, but that ultimately depends on Israelis growing up and becoming responsible citizens of the world, as opposed to their current preference as tyrants over one small patch of it.

I'm pretty certain that, given the chance, a democratic Gaza will not tolerate any attacks on Israel. Some Gazans may still decide to join ISIS or other extremist groups, but they will have to go into exile to do so, and will no longer be Gaza's responsibility. Plus, there will be far fewer of them once Israel stops "mowing the grass."

Other topics could be added to this, but why complicate things? I believe that there should be a right to exile, which would allow Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails to leave the country. That would be a better solution than simply trading hostages/prisoners.

My guiding rule for negotiations is to try to get to the right answer, one that works for all sides, with a minimum of impacts, and measure to increase trust and transparency. That may not always be possible, in which case you should look for other ways to compensate for perceived losses. (Gaza, in particular, is going to need a lot of aid.)

Let's put this part in bold:

Once you get to peace and justice, lots of things become possible. But it all starts with an Israeli cease-fire. That's all it takes to stop the killing, to halt the destruction. And that will at least slow down Israel's presently inexorable moral decay of into genocide -- and that of America, seeing as our leaders are currently in lockstep with Israel. So demand it! For once, it's obvious what's best for everyone!

Top story threads:

Israel:

• Mondoweiss: I'm not up to dredging through the daily New York Times reports on the war, but this heroic website gives you a better accounting of the tragic consequences of senseless war, and a lot less propaganda spin.

  • [11-15] Day 40: Israeli forces storm Al-Shifa Hospital, strip-naked and arrest people inside.

  • [11-16] Day 41: Israel ignores legally binding UNSC resolution, saying 'it will not happen.

  • [11-17] Day 42: Communications blackout obscures full picture of Israel's devastation in Gaza.

  • [11-18] Day 43: Israeli forces order evacuation of Al-Shifa' hospital, bomb schools in Gaza.

  • [11-19] Day 44: WHO says Israel turned Al-Shifa Hospital into 'death zone,' thousands of Palestinians 'humiliated as they flee to southern Gaza.

• Spencer Ackerman: [11-17] Gaza shows the difference between international law and the "rules-based international order": "Adherence to US hegemony determines who does -- and does not -- get to violate the architecture restraining state violence."

• Hugo Albuquerque: [11-17] Israeli Communist leader: The Netanyahu government has no answers: Interview with Eli Gozansky.

• Michael Arria: [11-16] March for Israel: "Thousands gathered in Washington this week to support Israel. The Israeli Consulate announced 290,000 people attended, while estimates show they were off by about 265,000. Still, support for Israel from elected officials was clear." Is there anything less meaningful than organizing a public showing of support for the powers that be?

• M Reza Benham: [11-15] The catastrophic roots of Zionism in Palestine: History back to Herzl, plus a suggestion that "it is time for the Arab world to use its formidable oil weapon to end the carnage." I don't see that happening: the "weapon" is less formidable now than in the 1970s, the political will is lacking (maybe the "Arab street" identifies with Palestinians, but the sheiks don't), and it's only been used of late to prop up sagging prices.

• Nader Durgham: [11-16] Do you want to understand the Gaza war? Look at the Beirut siege of 1982?

• Malay Firoz: [11-17] The unforgivable hypocrisy of the American liberal.

• Lev Grinberg: [11-15] For all its military might, Israel succumbed to its most fatal weakness: "The illusion that Israel could control Gaza endlessly is rooted in a dysfunctional political system that is incapable of imagining an alternative future."

• Jonathan Guyer: [11-18] Most of Israel's weapons imports come from the US. Now Biden is rushing even more arms.

• Yoav Haifawi: [11-18] First Tel Aviv anti-war demonstration reveals the limits on protest in today's Israel.

• Tareq S Hajjaj: [11-16] Rainfall on a destroyed Gaza could spell disaster.

• Jeet Heer: [11-17] Israel's ludicrous propaganda wins over the only audience that counts: "Why make an effort to be credible if you're going to be uncritically echoed by the White House and the Western press?"

• Marc Owen Jones: [11-15] Israel's comically bad disinfo proves they're losing the PR war.

• Rashid Khalidi: [11-18] A paradigm shift in the hundred years' war on Palestine?

• Talia Lavin: [11-17] These evangelicals are cheering the Gaza war as the end of the world: "Some far-right Christian leaders believe the bloodshed portends the second coming of Christ."

• Eric Levitz: [11-16] Sam Harris's fairy-tale account of the Israel-Hamas conflict: Harris first gained attention as a rare guy who was evangelical about atheism, which seemed like a refreshing twist, but turned out to be just another bigoted bore. So no surprise that "on questions of foreign policy, Harris's thinking can become nearly as dogmatic and blinkered as that of the religious zealots he's dedicated himself to discrediting."

• Branko Marcetic:

  • [11-15] US will take massive hit in global standing over Israel: "Washington's seeming refusal to use its leverage to stop civilian carnage may do more damage than even the Iraq War, experts say."

  • [11-16] US critics of Israel's war are being slandered for making the same criticisms as Israelis.

• Ruth Michaelson/Kaamil Ahmed: [11-19] 'It's basically hell on earth': Gaza City left totally bereft of healthcare.

• Mahmoud Mushtaha: [11-14] Palestinians fear 'slow death' as hunger and thirst spread in Gaza.

• Nicole Narea/Sigal Samuel: [11-13] How to think through allegations of genocide in Gaza: This is a long trawl through arguments I've dealt with extensively in recent weeks. I don't have time to rehash them here, but my considered take is pretty straightforward: the intent of Israel's leaders is clearly genocidal; Israel's actions (bombing, armed incursions, blockades) are indiscriminate, effectively aimed at the whole population; until Israel halts those operations, they merit the charge of genocide; if/when Israel ceases fire, withdraws, and allows third parties to provide aid, we might consider reducing the charge, as only such a end to hostilities can counter the charge. And, needless to say, the longer they take, the less credible their excuses.

• James North:

  • [11-11] The 'NYTimes' continues to slander and silence Students for Justice in Palestine and Jewish Voice for Peace.

  • [11-18] Years of mainstream media neglect of Palestinian reality means that truths come as shocks to most Americans.

• Jonathan Ofir/Yonathan Shapira/Ofer Neiman: [11-09] Do not dismiss the Gaza genocide allegations: Starts by noting an article by Eitay Mack in Harretz which tries to do just that.

• Gareth Porter: [11-17] Israeli deceit and the battle of Shifa Hospital: Also links to updates, including: [11-16] Israel searches for traces of Hamas in read of key Gaza hospital, finding "no command centre, hostages, Hamas fighters."

• Ali Rizk: [11-17] How US, Hezbollah interests align amid Gaza war: "Both worry about being dragged into a wider regional conflict." But both have funny ways of showing that, because Israel is locked into warring on Hezbollah, and the US is locked into blind support of Israel.

• Richard Silverstein:

  • [11-16] Israel's state of perpetual war and death: "Plans to wipe out 'hundreds' of Gaza families in revenge for Hamas attack."

  • [11-18] There's nothing Jewish about genocide: "We must not permit Israel to implicate us as Jews in its crimes."

• Aidan Simardone: [11-17] Israeli weapons are common to the displacement in Nagorno-Karabakh and Gaza.

• Reis Thebault: [11-18] Palestinian Americans face fear, violence amid Israel's war in Gaza.

• Philip Weiss: [11-19] Washington's approval of unending massacre is a 'stain upon our souls'. I haven't been citing Weiss's "Weekly Briefing" posts, but also see:

  • [11-05] It takes a genocide to open Americans' eyes.

  • [11-12] Real genocide vs fantasies of genocide.

  • [11-10] Israel's savage actions in the name of Jews make Jews unsafe.

• Robert Wright: [11-17] The truth about Hamas: This pretty much matches my understanding, at least from 2006. Israelis often complain about "not having a partner for peace," but there's little evidence that they ever wanted peace, and there's frequent evidence that they've pushed Palestinians into more radical stands so they'd have an excuse not to negotiate with them.

• Li Zhou: [11-15] The dire medical crisis in Gaza, explained.

Trump, and other Republicans:

• Mark Alfred: [11-17] Trump engaged in insurrection but can stay on Colorado's ballot anyway, court rules.

• Zack Beauchamp: [11-14] When Trump tells you he's an authoritarian, believe him: "He's talking like a fascist. He's planning fascist policies. He's staffing up with fascists."

• Ben Beckett: [11-16] Donald Trump has serious plans for the mass violations of civil rights.

• Bob Bishop: [11-17] Nikki Strangelove: 'How I learned to stop worrying and love the bomb.'

• Ryan Cooper:

  • [11-13] 'Moms for Liberty' fanatics lose out big-time: "It turns out that most parents are repelled by howling red-faced bigots threatening teachers and trying to ban books."

  • [11-15] House Republicans circle their own budget ouroboros once more

• Jarod Facundo: [11-15] Oklahoma Senator driven to violent frenzy by Teamsters president.

• Margaret Hartmann: [11-17] Trump's most unhinged plans for his second term.

• Zachary Petrizzo: [11-16] Trumpworld is already at war over staffing a new Trump White House.

• Luke Savage: [11-16] Rick Santorum just came out and said what conservatives really think of democracy.

• Matt Stieb: [11-17] The end looks near for George Santos.

Biden and/or the Democrats:

• Joe Biden: [11-18] The U.S. won't back down from the challenge of Putin and Hamas: But will the U.S. even recognize the challenge of Netanyahu and Zelensky? Like the proverbial hammer seeing everything else as a nail, the most heavily armed nation in the world hardly requires conscious thought to "stand up and fight."

• Kyle Anzalone: [11-16] Biden has 'productive discussion' with Xi, then slams Chinese leader as 'dictator'. Speaking "truth to power" may be overrated, given that power is rarely open to truth, but going behind power's back just makes you look petty.

• Mark Murray: [11-19] Poll: Biden's standing hits new lows amid Israel-Hamas war: Washington loves a good war. The American people, not so much so.

• Andrew O'Hehir: [11-18] Joe Biden at history's crossroads: Is backing Bibi's Gaza war a fatal mistake?

• Nathan J Robinson: [11-15] Does democracy mainly mean voting for Democrats?: "Heather Cox Richardson's narrative of Good Democrats and Bad Republicans lets liberals off the hook for their political failures." I've read two of her books on the Republican Party, and a few of her Substack columns, all of which are well researched and sensibly written, and I've put a lot of thought into writing a book exactly along those lines, so I was a pretty good prospect to pick up her new book, Democracy Awakening. But one thing that stopped me cold was a column (or maybe just a tweet) praising Biden's great accomplishments in foreign policy. I was surprised to find myself being pleasantly surprised by many aspects of the Biden presidency, but foreign policy has not been one of them.

• Alexander Sammon: [11-15] The Squad is about to fight for its political life: "AIPAC wants to show progressives that 'no one is safe from their wrath.'"

• Jeremy Scahill: [11-14] Biden's legacy should be forever haunted by the names of Gaza's dead children: "Biden's support for the terror bombing of Gaza continues his long history as a steadfast supporter of Israel's greatest crimes."

Legal matters and other crimes:

• Bindu Bansinath: [11-17] Ex-cop Brett Hankison again avoids conviction in Breonna Taylor killing.

• Ian Millhiser:

  • [11-13] l Democrats get surprisingly good news from America's Trumpest court: "The Fifth Circuit decided to obey the law, for a change."

  • [11-14] The Supreme Court's new ethics code is a joke: "The code is so weak that it serves to legitimize Clarence Thomas's corruption. It is literally worse than nothing."

Climate and environment:

• Scott Dance: [11-19] Earth passed a feared global warming milestone Friday, at least briefly: "Average global temperatures were more than 2 degrees Celsius above a pre-industrial benchmark on Friday, preliminary data show."

• Chico Harlan: [11-14] The world is 'woefully off track' on dozens of climate goals, scientists find.

• Umair Irgan/Rebecca Leber: [11-14] Biden gives center state to the climate report Trump tried to bury.

Economic matters:

• Dean Baker:

  • [11-13] Should we be worried about the deficit now?

  • [11-16] New York Times publishes hit piece on Bidenomics. The piece is by Karen Petrou [11-16] Bidenomics has a mortal enemy, and it isn't Trump. The Petrou piece has some of the most astonishing "how to lie with statistics" charts I've seen in years.

  • [11-19] Washington Post does its trash the Biden economy piece of the day. This one is by Abha Bhattarai: [11-19] New college grads are more likely to be unemployed in today's job market. That's 4.4%, vs. 3.6% for all workers.

Ukraine War and American Geopolitics: While the Ukraine quagmire only deepens, other stories pop up that fit into the broader domain of America's arms racket and imperial ambitions.

• Blaise Malley: [11-17] Diplomacy Watch: White House acknowledges difficult path ahead on Ukraine aid.

• Connor Echols: [11-16] Pentagon fails sixth audit in a row.

• Alex Horton/Dan Lamothe/Abigail Hauslohner: [11-19] A split emerges as Biden struggles to deter attacks on U.S. troops: Complaining about "Iranian proxies" in Syria and Iraq. I have three suggestions: leave; normalize relations with Iran; stop irritating everyone with blind support for Israeli genocide. Deterrence is much less likely to work than any of these. Partly because the targets are ill-defined, but mostly because it doesn't work. The first lesson we should learn from Ukraine is that strategies based on deterrence and sanctions are more likely to provoke than to stabilize conflict.

• John-Baptiste Oduor: [11-17] How Britain became America's stooge: Cue picture of GW Bush and his "poodle." A review of Tom Stevenson: Someone Else's Empire: British Illusions and American Hegemony.

• Nicolai N Petro/Ted Snider: [11-17] What's next for Ukraine: The outlines of a peaceful settlement: First I've heard of this "special status agreement." I've argued that the disputed territories should be given the choice in new elections (preferably with a second referendum in 5-7 years). The authors are certainly right that the only way to end the war is to negotiate something tolerable to both sides.

• James A Russell: [11-16] Ukraine challenges conventional wisdom of war on the high seas.

• Michael D Swaine: [11-16] The lost opportunity of the Biden-Xi meeting.

Around the world:

• Michael Horton: [11-17] Yemen's drone doom loop: A model of instability for fragile states.

• Steven Kosiak: [11-15] Is China's military the Goliath it's portrayed to be?

• Tom Phillips: [11-19] Argentina presidential election: far-right libertarian Javier Milei wins after rival concedes: I have no time or interest to dig into this, but my previous research suggested that Milei will instantly move to the top of the list of Worst Presidents in the World. Of course, how bad he really turns out to be will depend on how much real control he has over a very confusing political system.

Other stories:

Liza Featherstone: [11-17] Rich people in the US have been allowed to get way too rich.

Paul Rosenberg: [11-19] When a liberal president goes to war: Lessons of the LBJ era are relevant today.

Jeffrey St Clair: [11-17] Roaming Charges: Politics of the lesser exterminators.

Legacy: [11-19] Gerald "Jerry" Paske: Obituary. I'm saddened to note the death of my first philosophy professor, at 90. He taught the 101 intro course at Wichita State University, a big lecture class, and immediately turned us to reading Charles Sanders Peirce, the most interesting of the American pragmatists, and a perhaps unknowing gateway into the Marburg Neokantians. He always seemed like a decent, sensible guy, but the event that most impressed me was when, immediately after the Attica massacre, he put aside his prepared text and talked extemporaneously about the contempt for humanity that stoked the slaughter. After we returned to Wichita, he had retired, but every now and then he would write letters to the Eagle, always insightful, reliably decent. I found out then that he had written a short book, Why the Fundamentalist Right Is So Fundamentally Wrong. I tried to get in touch with him after my nephew Mike Hull finished his movie, Betrayal at Attica, but I never heard back.

[PS: In looking Paske up, I also found out that another of my WSU philosophy professors, Anthony Genova, died in 2010. I took his course on logic, which was mostly symbolic, but the opening section on informal fallacies was eye-opening. There are dozens of examples in the pieces I cite every week.]

I also see that Jonathan David Mott, the author of the blog Zandar Versus the Stupid, has passed away, at 48. I can't say as I've ever read him, but got the tip from No More Mister Nice Blog, who wrote: "He was always one of the most perceptive bloggers out there, and I will miss hearing from him as the world goes to hell."

I'm reminded that Norman G. Finkelstein published a book in 2018 called Gaza: An Inquest Into Its Martyrdom, which seems a bit premature at the moment, but no more so than it would have been to write a book on how alarming you found Nazi anti-semitism after Kristallnacht in 1938 (or after the Nuremberg Laws in 1935, when the die was cast, but still cloaked under the guise of law). Still, the book goes into great detail on Operation Cast Lead, the Goldstone Report, the Mavi Marmara, and Operation Protective Edge. The preface opens:

This book is not about Gaza. It is about what has been done to Gaza. It is fashionable nowadays to speak of a victim's agency. But one must be realistic about the constraints imposed on such agency by objective circumstance. Frederick Douglass could reclaim his manhood by striking back at a slave master who viciously abused him. Nelson Mandela could retain his dignity in jail despite conditions calibrated to humiliate and degrade him. Still, these were exceptional individuals and exceptional circumstances, and anyhow, even if he acquits himself with honor, the elemental decisions affecting the daily life of a man held in bondage and the power to effect these decisions remain outside his control. Gaza, as former British prime minister David Cameron observed, is an "open-air prison." The Israeli warden is in charge.

It's unfortunate that we keep resorting to Nazi Germany, Apartheid South Africa, the Slave Power in the United States, to provide some historical context for what Israel has done to Gaza, but those are by far the most relevant examples we are mostly aware of. But that's pretty much Israel's peer group. And I suppose those examples do offer one small bit of hope: they offer a range of possible endings to the still unfinished story of Israel and Gaza. In South Africa, reason and decency dismantled Apartheid. The other two regimes were destroyed in war, but not before the Nazis killed 6 million Jews, and lost 12 million of their own. The slave states lost their war as badly, but recovered to create a new system of oppression, which took another 100 years to dismantle (and could still use some work).

Daily Log

I got this letter from Duck Baker, declining to vote in FDJCP:

Thanks for reaching out. I don't feel I can participate in the poll as it is constructed now, for the simple reason that it gives readers a warped impression about the best releases of the year. Listing the 10 best new releases but only 3 that include all "historical/rara avis" tilts things in a way that cannot help people find out what the best releases are. If it were 3 reissues and 5, or even 3, previously unreleased, I could live with it. But I can't in conscience participate in a poll that gives such a distorted idea of what the BEST records are as this one does. My current/upciming reviews include important releases of previously unissued music by Johnny Griffith, Wes Montgomery and Archie Shepp at the height of their powers and the reissue of Montgomery's incredible Full House date with additional unissued material. We are supposed to pretend there were 10 new records of greater interest to jazz fans than whatever the least interesting of those titles? Why?? And that's just records I am reviewing; I could expand the list to 8 or 10 titles if I include excellent reissues for which I didn't place reviews this year, all of which include previously unreleased bonus material. As for straight reissues, we see dozens of beautifully remastered audiophile versions of classic titles every year. I'm kind of amazed that a lot of other writers don't see this as a problem, to be honest.

I wrote back:

You realize that you're quite free to express this opinion while still voting in the Poll, don't you?

We've had voters in the past who only voted in the Historical category, listing three records there, and none under New Releases or the other categories. It's always been optional to not vote in categories you don't want to vote in. We appreciate their interest, even if it don't tick all our boxes.

Secondly, I have a slot below each voter's ballot where I can add notes. Usually, I use this space to note where ballots violate the rules, but if you have a note that you want included, and keep it brief (one or two lines, please), I'd be happy to include it. It doesn't factor into the overall standings, but anyone who sees your ballot will see the note.

Third, I want to encourage people to write up their own lists, with reviews and/or comments if they like, and to publish them through whatever outlets they normally use. Lots of people do this. If I'm aware that they've published such a piece, I'll add a link to it in the note field.

Nobody's going to twist your arm, but those are all options within the Poll. If you choose to vote, we'd welcome your ballot, and I'll do whatever I can, within the rules, to indulge you.

If not, that's your choice. It would also be your choice if you'd like to run a different poll, focused on your interest in reissued and archival music. If you do so, you might consider asking me to vote, I could probably do that.

I also wrote the following, which I cut before sending:

I realize that the Poll rules aren't to everyone's taste. Francis set them in the early years, revising them only when he instituted the 10-year divide for previously unissued archival material. There were several reasons for this, but the biggest one is that it became a headache trying to get 100+ critics to agree on what's what. That problem cut both ways, with some voters always going for newly-discovered pieces by long-dead legends, and others never wanting to consider them as anything but historical. The 10-year-divide isn't perfect, but it mostly does keep the apples and oranges separate.

As for the 10-to-3 list length decision, Francis made that, and I've never seen much reason to quarrel with it. It wouldn't be hard to increase it to 5 (as JazzTimes does), but already at 3 we have many more voters stopping short than we have stopping short of 10 for New Releases. It's also the case that votes are much more concentrated in Historical than in New Releases, which is probably because that there are significantly fewer Historical than New releases to choose from.

I'm sure I could dig up numbers from my own lists that would confirm these points. For instance, in my jazz list for this year, I list (have heard and reviewed) 546 new releases, vs. 58 old/vault/reissues (same rule as we use in the Poll, a ratio of more than 9-to-1. Limited to A/A- records, the split drops to 62 vs. 13, so almost 5-to-1, but still more than the 3.3-to-1 of available ballot slots. And I used to write a reissues column called "Recycled Goods," so I'm not one of those critics with no interest in the past.

Daily Log

Robert Christgau forwarded me the request for papers/panels/etc. for PopCon 2024 (or whatever it's called), where the theme is "Legacy! Legacy! Music, Collections and Archives." Proposals due November 15 (i.e., tomorrow). They offered a long list of "guiding concepts," which included passing mention of copyright.

I wrote the following back to Christgau:

Way too fucking late for me, but if I did do something, it would be an absolutely blistering assault on copyright law. I don't think I understood how upset this makes me until this moment, thinking about it in terms of legacy. We habitually think of copyright as incentive to produce new work, which gives it an aura of plausibility, while burying the whole question of how it warps our understanding of everything that has happened before, which is really all we can understand.

Oh, and this is not something I want to put any time and effort to. This is just reaction.

Music Week

Expanded blog post, November archive (in progress).

Tweet: Music Week: 52 albums, 3 A-list

Music: Current count 41160 [41108] rated (+52), 22 [28] unrated (-6).

Spent way too much time the last few days knocking together another Speaking of Which. To little or no avail, I suspect, but that's what we do around here.

What I should have been doing was getting the 18th Annual Francis Davis Jazz Critics Poll rolling. I've been saying all along that I'd get the ballots sent out by November 15, which this week is known as Wednesday. I do have the website set up, but have a lot more writing I want to get done -- both to explain the nitty gritty details to users, voters, and myself. The voting itself will be exactly as it was last year, and many years before that. The big problem is deciding who gets to vote, contacting them, and making sure they're on board. We dropped from 156 to 151 voters last year, and I fear that was mostly due to email failures. My fears in that regard got much worse early this year when I discovered that lots of mail from my server wasn't getting delivered. Fixing that was never clear nor simple, so I'm starting from an expectation that this is going to be a tough slog.

It would be nice if all my voters read this blog, or some blog I could communicate via, or at least followed me on X, but that's certainly not the case. What I do have to communicate with are two mailing lists. One is kept in my mailer, which I can then run through a "mail merge" extension to generate individualized messages. I have a shortened invite file, which I intend to run through that grinder later this week. Those I consider the official invites. (For late invites, I'll just use that as boilerplate for private messages.) The other is a GNU Mailman list on my server, which more or less has the same addresses (but maintained separately, ugh!). I'm going to send them a "heads up" message before I send out the invites. Then I'll use that list for subsequent updates: probably 2-3 reminders to vote, a deadline notice, an updates or two on publication dates, including a done. Neither of these work as well as I'd like, but they make it possible to keep most people fairly well informed along the way.

I thought I'd get started on expanding the voter list more than a month ago, and indeed I did (barely) get started, but once again I'm up against a crunch deadline. I have a few new names ready to add now, and a system set up to find more, but I'm still looking for helpful suggestions. One thing I have discovered so far is that the talent pool isn't lacking. I sent out 200 invites last year, to get 151 ballots back. I'm hoping for maybe 250 invites this year. I doubt it will make much difference to the standings, but 50 more voters will probably add 150 more albums to the overall list, and that, I think, would be a big plus. One thing I do with my tracking file is include any year-old album (2022) that I've only noticed in 2023 (i.e., that wasn't in the 2022 tracking file -- one that included everything that got a vote last year) and I have about 75 such records so far this year. By the way, in this year's file the current jazz count is 952 (603 heard by me).

I managed to make a first pass on my EOY files for Jazz and Non-Jazz, currently with 60 and 42 A-list new releases, respectively. We still have a fair ways to go, but that's well below 2022's 75 jazz and way below 2022's 83 non-jazz. For B+(***) albums, new jazz has 145 (vs. 195 in 2022), new non-jazz has 77 (vs. 122 in 2022)

The overall rated number is 1085 in 2023 (604 jazz), vs. 1669 in 2022 (898 jazz), so I'm down 34.9% in rated records this year, down 32.7% in jazz, more in non-jazz. HM/A-list jazz is down 26.2%, while non-jazz is down much more, 44.3%. In some sense, I'm not surprised: The 2022 totals were ridiculously high, so I knew I was going to slip, and through the health scares and what not I figured that to be a good thing. I can't keep racking up those numbers, and having passed 41,000, I don't really want to anymore.

Those numbers will even out a bit over the next couple months, but the drop from 83 to 42 is pretty extreme. One odd thing is that the last two Christgau Consumer Guides have failed to land a single A- on my list (after 4 in September). I didn't think much of that in October, which still has several albums I haven't found, but only Hemlocke Springs in November inspired so much as a second play. But thus far only 14 of my 42 A-list non-jazz albums got an A/A- from Christgau (2 of which I bumped on re-listens after his reviews). Probably says more about me than him, but I know not what.

Lots of records, hastily considered, below. Dave Bayles was actually a post-break listen today (so not in the 52 count), but I figured I might as well report it now. Ortiz, by the way, was a previous Monday listen, so a long stretch where very little blew me away.

Naked Lunch, by the way, was in response to a question, but I haven't gotten around to writing it up in answer form yet.

One more note: I added some code to the RSS generator to split the feed to just provide Music Week or Speaking of Which files: see the left nav menu, under Networking. I never got much feedback on how the RSS stuff is working (and rarely look at it myself, although my mailer dutifully collects the entries). But I regularly look at No More Mister Nice Blog, and I'd like to get back on his blog roll, so it seemed like a good idea. I also found that the Christgau RSS feed has been broken for months, which nobody pointed out. All that took was a "&" instead of "&" in the content, and kerblooey!

New records reviewed this week:

• Lina Allemano/Axel Dörner: Aphelia (2019 [2023], Relative Pitch): [sp]: B+(*)
• JD Allen: This (2023, Savant): [sp]: B+(***)
• Atlantic Road Trip: One (2023, Calligram): [cd]: B+(**)
• Dave Bayles Trio: Live at the Uptowner (2023, Calligram): [cd]: A-
• Bombino: Sahel (2023, Partisan): [sp]: B+(***)
• Boygenius: The Rest (2023, Interscope, EP): [sp]: B
• Zach Bryan: Summertime Blues (2022, Warner, EP): [sp]: B+(**)
• Zach Bryan: Boys of Faith (2023, Warner, EP) **
• Calcanhar: Jump (2023, Clean Feed): [bc]: B+(*)
• Chief Adjuah: Bark Out Thunder Roar Out Lightning (2023, Ropeadope): [sp]: B+(***)
• CMAT: Crazymad, for Me (2023, CMATBaby/AWAL): [sp]: B+(***)
• Mike DiRubbo: Inner Light (2023, Truth Revolution): [cd]: B+(***) [11-17]
• Mia Dyberg Trio: Timestretch (2022 [2023], Clean Feed): [sp]: B+(*)
• Nataniel Edelman Trio: Un Ruido De Agua (2022 [2023], Clean Feed): [bc]: B+(***)
• Phillip Greenlief/Scott Amendola: Stay With It (2017 [2023], Clean Feed): [bc]: B+(***)
• Fritz Hauser & Pedro Carneiro: Pas De Deux (2022 [2023], Clean Feed): [bc]: B
• Scott Hesse Trio: Intention (2023, Calligram): [cd]: B+(**)
• The Hives: The Death of Randy Fitzsimmons (2023, Disques Hives): [sp]: B+(***)
• Horse Lords: Live in Leipzig (2022 [2023], RVNG Intl): [sp]: B+(*)
• Mikko Innanen/Stefan Pasborg/Cedric Piromalli: Can You Hear It? (2022 [2023], Clean Feed): [bc]: B+(**)
• Guillermo Klein Quinteto: Telmo's Tune (2023, Sunnyside): [sp]: B+(**)
• L'Rain: I Killed Your Dog (2023, Mexican Summer): [sp]: B+(**)
• Liquid Mike: S/T [Self-Titled] (2023, Kitschy Spirit, EP): [sp]: B+(***)
• Liquid Mike: Stuntman (2021, Lost Dog): [sp]: B
• Liquid Mike: You Can Live Forever in Paradise on Earth (2021, Sweet Chin Music, EP): [sp]: B [sp]

Liquid Mike: A Beer Can and a Bouquet (2022, self-released, EP): [sp]: B+(**)

• Nellie McKay: Hey Guys, Watch This (2023, Hungry Mouse): [sp]: B+(**)
• Mercury [Nicolas Caloia & Lori Freedman]: Skin (2023, Clean Feed): [bc]: B+(**)
• Allison Miller: Rivers in Our Veins (2023, Royal Potato Family): [sp]: B+(***)
• Steve Million: Perfectly Spaced (2023, Calligram): [cd]: B+(**)
• Simon Nabatov 3+2: Verbs (2022 [2023], Clean Feed): [bc]: B+(**)
• Simon Nabatov: Extensions (2022 [2023], Unbroken Sounds): [sp]: B+(**)
• Aruán Ortiz: Pastor's Paradox (2022 [2023], Clean Feed): [cd]: A-
• Ethan Philion Quartet: Gnosis (2023, Sunnyside): [sp]: B+(***)
• R. Ring: War Poems, We Rested (2023, Don Giovanni): [sp]: B+(*)
• Ned Rothenberg: Crossings Four (2022 [2023], Clean Feed): [bc]: B+(***)
• Jerome Sabbagh: Vintage (2020 [2023], Sunnyside): [sp]: B+(**)
• A. Savage: Several Songs About Fire (2023, Rough Trade): [sp]: B+(**)
• Troye Sivan: Something to Give Each Other (2023, Capitol): [sp]: B+(**)
• Hemlocke Springs: Going . . . Going . . . Gone! (2023, Good Luck Have Fun, EP): [sp]: B+(***)
• Yuhan Su: Liberated Gesture (2023, Sunnyside): [cd]: B+(***)
• Kevin Sun: The Depths of Memory (2021-22 [2023], Endectomorph Music, 2CD): [cd]: B+(***)
• Grzegorz Tarwid Trio: Flowers (2022 [2023], Clean Feed): [bc]: B+(***)
• Teen Jesus and the Jean Teasers: I Love You (2023, Domestic La La): [sp]: B+(**)
• Trespass Trio Feat. Susana Santos Silva: Live in Oslo (2018 [2023], Clean Feed): [bc]: B+(**)
• Daniel Villarreal: Lados B (2020 [2023], International Anthem): [sp]: A-
• Jennifer Wharton's Bonegasm: Grit & Grace (2023, Sunnyside): [cd]: B+(***)

Recent reissues, compilations, and vault discoveries:

• Jouk Minor/Josef Traindl/Jean Querlier/Christian Lété/Dominique Regef: Enfin La Mer (1978 [2023], NoBusiness): [cd]: B+(***)

Old music:

• The Hives: Barely Legal (1997, Burning Heart): [sp]: B+(*)
• The Hives: The Black and White Album (2007, A&M/Octone): [sp]: B+(*)
• Howard Shore/Ornette Coleman/London Philharmonic Orchestra: Naked Lunch [The Complete Original Soundtrack Remastered] (1991 [2014], Howe): [sp]: B+(*)

Unpacking: Found in the mail last week:

• Rich Halley Quartet: Fire Within (Pine Eagle) [12-01]
• Hannah Marks: Outsider, Outlier (Out of Your Head) [10-23]
• Trio San: Hibiki (Jazzdor) [11-10]

Speaking of Which

Blog link.

I started this mid-week, way too early for what I rarely intend as anything more than casual note-taking, but with elections on Tuesday and the "kiddie-table debate" on Wednesday (credit the quote to SNL's Trump personifier), the stories piled up fast. Most of the early ones just got links, but some inevitably provoked one-liners, and soon enough longer disquisitions ensued. But some of the most important pieces are barely noted, like the Savage and Shafer pieces on Trump's second-term ambitions. (Sure, they're not exactly new news, but the new articles are more detailed and comprehensive.)

Still, mostly Israel this week, mostly rehashing points that were obvious from the start of October 7. The story there is, as it's always been, about power and resistance. As noted last week, Gabriel Winant described Israel as "a machine for the conversion of grief into power." That grief brings with it a great deal of anger and righteousness, which goes a long ways to explaining why Israeli power has been remarkably successful for so long. But the problem is that power never quite works the way you want it to. Every effort to exercise power, to impose your will on other people, meets the resistance of what we might as well call the human spirit. And that resistance takes a toll, both physical and psychic, as despite the hubris of the powerful, they too have human spirits.

So while the "Israel-Hamas War" since October 7, starting with one spectacular day of rebellion followed by a month-and-counting of relentless, methodical slaughter, has been an object lesson in the massive superiority of Israeli military power, it doesn't feel like a victory, least of all to the Israelis. For one thing, the revolt punctured Israel's long-held belief that power makes them invulnerable. For another, they're slowly coming to realize that they can't kill and destroy enough to stamp out resistance, which will return and flourish in their ruins. And finally, they're beginning to suspect that any victory they can claim will prove hollow. In this understanding, the world is moving way ahead of its leaders, perhaps because the human spirit is concentrated among the powerless, among those whose minds aren't corrupted by their pursuit and cultivation of power.

Given this, calling for an immediate cease-fire should be the easiest political decision ever. Even if your sympathies and/or identity is fully with Israel, an immediate halt is the only way to stop adding to the cumulative damage, not just to Palestinian lives but to Israel's tarnished humanity. Because, and we should be absolutely clear on this, what Israel has been doing for more than a month now isn't self-defense, isn't deterrence, isn't even retaliation: it is genocide. That is the intent, and that is the effect of their tools and tactics. Genocide is a practice that the whole world should, and eventually will, condemn. And while the roots of the impulse run deep in Israel's political history, down to the very core tenets of Zionism, we should understand that the actions were conscious decisions of specific political leaders, aided by key people who followed their orders, abetted by political parties that bought into their mindset. While it is very unlikely that even those leaders will ever be adequately punished -- as if such a thing is even possible -- unwinding their support will start to make amends.

It feels like I should keep going with this argument, but I'm dead tired, and rather sick of the whole thing, so will leave it at that.

I tossed this tweet out on Thursday:

Re Biden's polls, this "wag the dog" effect doesn't seem to be working. Rather than rallying behind the leader, it seems like he's getting blamed for all wars, even when few object to his policy. Have folks begun to realize all wars are preventable? So each reveals failure!

Top story threads:

Israel: The ground war, ostensibly against Hamas, as well as the air war, really against all of Gaza, continues as it has since the Oct. 7 prison break. This section quickly gets filled up with opinion pieces, largely due to our vantage point far from the action, partly due to our intimate involvement with the long-running conflict, and the dire need to insist on a cease fire to put a stop to the mounting destruction, and allow for some measure of recovery to begin. So the actual day-to-day details tend to escape my interest. To obtain some sense of that, I thought I'd just list the headlines in the New York Times "updates" file(s):

November 12:

• More patients die at major Gaza hospital amid fuel delivery dispute
• Crisis heightens at Gaza's main hospital amid dispute over desperately needed fuel.
• The U.S. carried out another round of airstrikes in Syria on Iran-linked targets.
• Netanyahu says he sees no role for the Palestinian Authority in Gaza, for now.
• Al-Quds Hospital halts operation as it runs out of fuel and power, the Red Crescent says.
• The U.S. warns Israel to avoid fighting in hospitals.
• Over 100,000 march in France against antisemitism.
• A U.N. residential compound in southern Gaza came under fire, officials say.
• Demands grow for a pause in fighting as the humanitarian situation worsens.
• Chris Christie is the first Republican presidential candidate to visit Israel since Oct. 7.
• Calls grow for Israel to pause fighting
• Demands grow for a pause in fighting as the humanitarian situation worsens.

November 11:

• Gaza's main hospital struggles to keep patients alive
• Gaza's main hospital is without power and at a breaking point as fighting closes in.
• Thousands of protesters in Tel Aviv called on Israel to prioritize rescuing the hostages.
• Hezbollah's leader says his fighters will keep up pressure on Israel.
• Across Europe, thousands call for cease-fire in Gaza. [Photos of demonstrations in Edinburgh, Barcelona, London, and Brussels.]
• Surrounded by Israeli troops, Palestinians evacuate a cluster of hospitals in northern Gaza.
• Iran and Saudi Arabia, regional rivals, call for Gaza cease-fire at summit.
• Here's a map of the Gaza City hospitals Israel has been closing in on.
• Life in Gaza City: Privation, rationing and desperate fear.
• The W.H.O. chief says more than 250 attacks on Gaza and West Bank health care facilities have been verified.

November 10:

• Israel lowers Oct. 7 death toll estimate to 1,200
• Israel has struggled to distinguish the remains of Oct. 7 victims from those of attackers.
• 'These babies, these ladies, these old people': Macron mourns civilian deaths and urges an Israeli cease-fire.
• Concerns grow for hospital patients and sheltering civilians.
• The W.H.O. chief says more than 250 attacks on Gaza and West Bank health care facilities have been verified.
• Al-Shifa Hospital is increasingly a flashpoint in the war.
• Israel steps up airstrikes inside Lebanon following Hezbollah drone and missile attacks.
• Israel is on high alert as regional threats from Iran-backed militants grow.
• Israel's public defenders refuse to represent Oct. 7 attackers.
• America's top diplomat says 'far too many Palestinians have been killed.'
• Israel is considering a deal for Hamas to release all civilian hostages in Gaza, officials say.
• Antisemitic hate crimes soared in New York City last month. [E.g., "police are searching . . . vandals who scrawled 'Hamas' and antisemitic graffiti on several Upper East Side apartment buildings last month."]
• The war has led to the deadliest month for journalists in at least three decades.
• U.N. human rights chief says Israel should end bombardment with heavy munitions.
• Intense protests again shut down Midtown Manhattan streets.
• The Israeli police detained Arab Israeli politicians preparing a vigil against Gaza srikes, civic groups say.

November 9:

• Israel expands daily combat pauses to let civilians flee, White House says
• Israel has agreed to put in place regular daily four-hour pauses for civilians to flee, the White House said.
• A day of fierce combat and diplomatic talks ends with a deal to try to help Gazans reach safety.
• Islamic Jihad releases a video of two Israeli hostages in Gaza.
• The war has taken a staggering toll on the Palestinian economy.
• Israeli police detained five Arab Israeli politicians who planned a vigil against Gaza strikes, civic groups say.
• The C.I.A. director and the Israeli intelligence chief met with Qatari officials to discuss a possible Hamas hostage deal.
• Intense protests again shut down Midtown Manhattan streets.
• Video offer glimpses of battle in Gaza.
• Casualties in Gaza may be 'even higher' than previously thought, a U.S. official told Congress.
• Palestinian officials say 18 are killed in the West Bank as violence spikes.
• Chickenpox, scabies and other diseases surge in Gaza, the W.H.O. says.
• Macron convenes an aid conference on worsening conditions in Gaza.
• Archaeologists look for traces of the missing in the ashes of Hamas's attack.

Also see Maps: Tracking the Attacks in Israel and Gaza: Sections there:

• [11-09] Strikes hit hospitals, schools and other shelters for displaced people in the Gaza Strip
• [11-07] A third of buildings in northern Gaza are damaged or destroyed, analysis estimates
• [11-05] Frequent fighting along the Israel-Lebanon border continues as tensions mount
• [11-03] Where Israel's invasion has cut Gaza in two
• [11-02] Where Israeli forces are advancing toward Gaza City
• [10-31] At least a quarter of buildings in northern Gaza are damaged, analysis estimates
• [10-30] Where Israeli troops are encircling Gaza City
• [10-29] A more detailed look at Israel's advance into northern Gaza
• [10-28] Where Israeli military videos show ground forces entering Gaza
• [10-26] A new look at where Israel has hit Gaza
• [10-23] Deadliest period for Palestinians in the West Bank in 15 years

The file goes on, including several entries on the Oct. 18 blast at Ahli Arab Hospital, declaring the cause and death toll to be unclear. In addition to maps, there is a lot of aerial photography of destruction.

Some more news articles, mostly from the New York Times:

• [11-11] Major pro-Palestinian march staged in London as police ramp up security: "The gathering drew an estimated 300,000 people."

• [11-10 20:00]: Harvard, Columbia and Penn pledge to fight antisemitism on campus: "The universities are trying to address criticism by banning pro-Palestinian student groups, condemning slogans and starting task forces to address antisemitism." One of the "antisemitic" groups is Jewish Voice for Peace.

• [11-10 18:52]: Gaza City hospitals are caught in deadly crossfire: "Battling Hamas fighters, Israeli forces are 'closing in' on hospitals where thousands of people are stranded, while the U.S. diplomat says 'far too many Palestinians have been killed.'"

• [11-09 17:05]: Israeli forces have limited time in Gaza, U.S. officials say : "Israel's response to the Hamas attacks has fueled sympathy around the world for the Palestinian cause even as Israel continues to bury its dead."

• [11-06]: The State Department approves $320 million sale of guided bomb equipment to Israel.

If you want something that reads less like Israeli Pravda, Mondoweiss has a daily summary:

• [11-12] Day 37: Al-Shifa Hospital no longer functioning as Israeli ground troops surround the hospital

• [11-11] Day 36: Al-Shifa Hospital at epicenter of Gaza fighting as fleeing civilians are killed by Israeli strikes.

• [11-10] Day 35: Tanks besiege Gaza City hospitals as Israel ramps up attacks on medical centers.

• [11-09] Day 34: Children who survive the bombs may die of starvation, disease, and dehydration
• [11-08] Day 33: U.S. fears reoccupation of Gaza 'not the right thing to do' as Hamas targets Israeli tanks
• [11-07] Day 32: UN warns Israel has turned Gaza into "graveyard for children" as attack enters second month
• [11-06] Day 31: Israel continues ground advance into Gaza as civilians face starvation

Here are this week's batch of articles:

• Paula Aceves: [11-07] The corporate and cultural fallout from the Israel-Hamas war: Updated, though with new outrages every day, they're falling behind.

• Geoffrey Aronson: [11-09] The ghost of Ariel Sharon hovers over the Gaza Strip.

• Michael Arria: [11-10] Columbia University suspends Students for Justice in Palestine and Jewish Voice for Peace.

• Bill Astore: [11-11] When collateral damage is the strategy: "Buildings destroyed, civilians killed, millions made refugees: mission accomplished."

• Omer Bartov: [11-10] What I believe as a historian of genocide: Author is "a professor of Holocaust and genocide studies at Brown University," a job description which suggests viewpoint as much as expertise, or if it doesn't to you, just read his quibbles and hair-splitting.

  The Holocaust was the ne plus ultra of genocides. Nothing else comes remotely close in either the scale, the speed, or the single-mindedness of the killing, but the impulse, the intent, was hardly unique to Nazi Germany. That's why the generic term was coined: not to describe specifically what Nazi Germany did -- Shoah and Holocaust suffice for that -- but to identify comparable forces of which Nazi Germany is one obvious example.

  Bartov makes this clear when he cites the UN definition of genocide: "the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such." Immediately after Oct. 7, many prominent Israelis, including the Prime Minister, were very explicit about their intent to commit genocide. The subsequent bombing killed indiscriminately, and created conditions to kill further. The scale of the destruction easily satisfies "in part." And the destruction is continuing, with no end in sight. That sure sounds like genocide to me.

  Do we really have to wait until the last Palestinian is killed? No one has tried to argue that since some Jews survived in Auschwitz, the Nazis fell short of "the crime of crimes." By the way, the line Bartov draws between "ethnic cleansing" (which he defines as "aims to remove a population from a territory") and real genocide is spurious -- the intent and practical effect is the same, and the term itself is fraught (it was originally a Serbian euphemism for mass killing, bound to notions of racial and/or ethnic purity). I think it's caught on because older terms like "removal," "transfer," and "exile" seemed too sanitary, but they are all instances of the same hideous mindset.

  Of course, if Israel ceases its assault on Gaza, and behaves decently in the aftermath (which minimally includes arresting the pogroms in the West Bank), we might reduce the charge, granting that they weren't fully intent on genocide. But right now is not the time to make excuses for what they are doing. Also see:

  • Kenn Orphan: [11-10] It is time to stop mincing words. This is genocide.

  • Sasha Friedman/Sig Giordano/Ari Bee: [11-11] As Jews we know, this is not war. It's genocide.

  • Saleh Abdel Jawad: [11-10] The genocide in Gaza is one of the worst in modern history.

• Zack Beauchamp: [11-09] In the West Bank, Israeli settlers are on an anti-Palestinian rampage: "Since October 7, settler radicals have been attacking Palestinians at an unprecedented rate -- uprooting entire communities and threatening a wider war."

• Jason Burke: [11-06] 'I could never dream such a nightmare': Gaza in grip of humanitarian disaster.

• Isaac Chotiner: [11-11] The extreme ambitions of West Bank settlers: Interview with Daniella Weiss, a longtime leader of the settler movement and an ally of Bezalel Smotrich ("the extremist minister of finance, who has said that the Palestinian people do not exist and that Palestinian communities need to be erased").

• Sandhya Dirks: [10-23] Palestinian Americans on the Israel-Hamas war: 'We're not even allowed to grieve'.

• Thomas L Friedman: [11-09] I have never been to this Israel before: For many decades, Israel's number one fanboy, but lately he's been disturbed by the Netanyahu government's far-right turn, especially the decision to restack the courts against democracy, and he's even shown signs of sobriety in the wake of the Oct. 7 attacks. However, with his return to Tel Aviv, he's back in the fold, reprogrammed to parrot Israel's existential fears, even if the "I love Bibi" module hasn't kicked in yet. He outlines "three key reasons" why Israel is in "more danger than at any other time since its War of Independence in 1948".

  The first is an array of daunting enemies ("modern armies with brigades, battalions, cybercapabilities, long-range rockets, drones and technical support" -- mostly Iran-backed, "and now even the openly Hamas-embracing Vladimir Putin"; "all of them seemed to surface together like dragons during this conflict").

  The second danger is that Israel's ability "to fight such a difficult war with so many enemies" is critically dependant on "unwavering partners abroad, led by the United States," including "a coalition of U.S., European and moderate Arab partners," which is tricky as long as Netanyahu's basic pitch is "help us defeat Hamas in Gaza while we work to expand settlements, annex the West Bank and build a Jewish supremacist state there" -- i.e., exactly what Israel has been doing since the June 1967 war. So the third danger is really just Netanyahu himself: "the worst leader in [Israel's] history -- maybe in all of Jewish history -- who has no will or ability to produce such an initiative."

  Let's get real here. This is probably the worst case of threat inflation since the run up to the 1967 war, where a government that had absolute confidence in its ability to defeat its combined enemies (which it did decisively in six days, and those enemies really did have planes, tanks, and battalions) yet spent several months scaring the daylights out of its own citizens to justify its aggression. None of today's "enemies" have the wherewithal to do any serious damage to Israel, let alone the desire to expose themselves to retaliation that could include nuclear weapons. (Ok, Hamas had the desire, but that was only because they were desperate enough to mount what was effectively a suicide raid, but even that threat is now spent.)

  As for the alliance, while Israel always welcomes American arms and money (and, as Moshe Dayan explained, ignores the advice that comes with it), Israel needs no help containing Hamas, intimidating Hezbollah, or beating up on Palestinians. And they could flip "the Iran threat" in an instant if they just told Biden to make up with Iran and let them buy some Boeing airliners. Israel's problem is not that they need help fighting. It's that they need help calling off the fight, which is the only thing they know how to do, the only thing they've prepared for, but against such a weakened enemy looks more and more like genocide, making them out to be monsters. Sure, Biden hasn't turned on them yet, but all around the world it's getting harder and harder to ignore that this war is Israel's true self, fashioned over a century of continuous conflict.

  Here's a quick rundown of Friedman's columns, showing how quickly his initial caution gave way to the company line. One common thread throughout is that there's never the slightest inkling of sympathy for any Palestinians:

  • [10-16] Why a Gaza invasion and 'once and for all' thinking are wrong for Israel.

  • [10-19] Israel is about to make a terrible mistake.

  • [10-25] Israel: From the six-day war to the six-front war.

  • [10-29] The Israeli officials I speak with tell me they know two things for sure.

  • [11-02] The two things worrying U.S. military officials about Israel and Hamas: Russia, which is trying to keep Ukraine from joining Europe, and Israel from joining "the new Middle East." And Iran. It's always Iran, isn't it?

• Masha Gessen:

  • [11-08] Inside the Israeli crackdown on speech.

  • [11-12] How to maintain hope in an age of catastrophe: Interview with Robert Jay Lifton. Gessen quotes from Lifton's book about Hiroshima, Death in Life, which I read shortly after it came out in 1968: "We are all survivors of Hiroshima, and, in our imaginations, of future nuclear holocaust." Ever since then, I've been touched by that same imagination, the ability to see oneself both as victim and survivor, of the worst human tragedies, also the most mundane.

• Farrah Hassen: [11-10] Americans want a ceasefire; it's our politicians who are out of touch. It's our politicians who are owned, with many of them trapped in a belief system that sees war as a noble activity.

• Yoav Haifawi: [11-11] From the river to the sea: There is one Israeli dictatorship: "How repression is deepening inside the Israeli dictatorship."

• Ellen Ioanes: [11-11] Israel's humanitarian pauses in Gaza, explained: Well, it's pretty simple: Israel wants to drive Palestinains out of northern Gaza, so they can complete its demolition while lessening the staggering number of casualties they're inflicting. They also hope the southward tide of refugees will empty out into Egypt, never to return. A cease fire wouldn't help, as it would just encourage people to stay in or close to their homes. But as long as more bombing is coming, people are motivated to flee for their lives. That's basically how the Nakba worked in 1948-49. The legal term for it today is genocide. Israeli apologists may tell you it's just "ethnic cleansing," but that phrase has never been anything but a euphemism. "Humanitarian" isn't even that.

• Sarah Jones: [11-10] Listen to dissenters on Israel.

• Nicki Kattoura/Geo Maher: [11-09] Why must Palestinians condemn themselves for daring to fight back?

• Karim Khan: [11-10] We are witnessing a pandemic of inhumanity: to halt the spread, we must cling to the law: Author is chief prosecutor at ICC.

• Jen Kirby: [11-11] The Israel-Gaza war is exposing Europe's divisions.

• Nicholas Kristof: [11-11] 'We cannot kill our way out of this endeavor'. He's never been someone I look to for insight, but sometimes the simpleton is right. Since I've listed Thomas Friedman's op-eds above, here are his (do you suppose his job at the Times is to make up for Friedman's empathy deficit?):

  • [10-11] Seeking a moral compass in Gaza's war.

  • [10-14] What does destroying Gaza solve?

  • [10-21] We must not kill Gazan children to try to protect Israel's children.

  • [10-25] 'I'm crying for all the victims that are going to suffer'.

  • [10-28] A man orphaned by Hamas calls on Israel: Stop the 'cycle of blood'.

  • [10-28] 'We are overpaying the price for a sin we didn't commit'.

  • [11-01] The words in the Middle East that are breaking my heart.

  • [11-04] Losing hope in the west bank: Photographs by William Keo.

  • [11-08] Meet the champions of nuance and empathy we need.

• Eric Levitz: [11-09] The two-state solution is still our only (distant) hope. Curiously, there's no section here explaining what the much vaunted "two-state solution" might look like these days. That hardly matters, because the real stickler for Israelis is "solution": they've never wanted one, and now that they have a clear war path, they sure don't want one now. If they did, I have no doubt they could make something work. All it really takes is some system that allows Palestinians to live where they are now in some measure of peace and dignity. They could be citizens of Israel ("one-state") or of some other entity ("two states" or some kind of confederation or bination) or some combination of the two. The problem is that no one can force them to allow peace/dignity, and they've become too twisted to see that would be better for them as well. Indeed, that's been a given for so long that the main selling point behind "two states" was that it would allow Israel to exclude most Palestinians from their apartheid state. Still, even that promise wasn't good enough for Israel's leaders. They insisted not only on separation but on distinct systems of law and order to maintain their superiority and to punish and control the unchosen.

• Louisa Loveluck: [11-09] Settler violence is erasing Palestinian communities in the West Bank. Which leads to Yasmeen Abutaleb: [11-10] White House urges Israel to curtail settler violence in West Bank. Which leads to, well, nothing.

• Ruth Margalit: [11-11] The long wait of the hostages' families. This shouldn't be a hard problem. The way to save the hostages is to stop destroying Gaza. Given that Israel has nothing to gain, and good will to lose, from further destruction of Gaza, a long-term cease-fire the obvious first step. After that, release of the hostages will depend more on whether the people holding them can trust Israel not to break its cease-fire than on any negotiated swaps.

  Israel's own bad faith in this was shown by their immediate efforts to scoop up hundreds or thousands of Palestinians, making them hostages as well -- though our press simply calls them "prisoners." Hostage negotiations are always nasty business, fraught with overtones of extortion, feeding into the fear that each successful negotiation will incentivize more hostage-taking. The real challenge is to find the right thing to do regardless. That's often difficult, but here it's remarkably easy: stop the genocide.

• Aaron Maté:

  • [10-15] The roots of Israel's ethnic cleansing in Gaza: "Israel has always chosen occupation and supremacy over peace and security."

  • [10-24] Joe Biden's Armageddon, from Gaza to Ukraine.

  • [11-10] Biden's 'personal attachment to Israel' fuels its massacres in Gaza.

• James North: [11-09] "Hostages?" How the U.S. media is distorting the news from Palestine.

• Orly Noy: [11-10] The Israeli public has embraced the Smotrich doctrine: "The internalization of the far-right minister's 'Decisive Plan' is evident in the popular support for a new ultimatum for Gaza: emigration or annihilation."

• Yumna Patel: [11-09] 'Thought police': Israel passes law criminalizing 'consumption of terrorist materials': By "materials" they mostly mean publications.

• Samah Salaime: [11-06] For Israeli leaders, every Palestinian citizen has a seat on the bus to Gaza.

• Sarah Salem: [11-09] Palestinians in the U.S. are under attack.

• Alex Shams: [11-10] 'They don't want people to know we exist': "Palestinians across the West Bank describe what life has been like since October 7."

• Richard Silverstein:

  • [11-08] Biden administgration to fund Gaza ethnic cleansing.

  • [11-09] Gaza and modes of media hate.

• Jeffrey St Clair: [11-04] An infinite distance [The scourging of Gaza: Diary of a genocidal war]: Behind the paywall, a long list of bullet points like his "Roaming Charges" posts.

• Nahal Toosi: [11-06] U.S. diplomats slam Israel policy in leaked memo.

• Li Zhou: [11-09] The House censure of Rashida Tlaib, explained. One of the charges was her use of a slogan, "From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free." For more on this terminology, see Jewish Currents editor Arielle Angel: What does "From the river to the sea" really mean?, which includes a reprint of a 2021 article by Yousef Munayyer. Also:

  • Robert Wright: [11-10] The 'river to the sea' Rorschach test.

Tuesday's elections: Democrats came away with some bragging rights, but none of these results were resounding wins:

• Kentucky governor: Andy Beshear (D) 52.5%, Daniel Cameron 47.5%
• Mississippi governor: Tate Reeves (R) 51.5%, Brandon Presley (D) 47.1%
• Virginia State Senate: 21 Democrats, 19 Republicans; State House: 51 Democrats, 48 Republicans, 1 undecided (R leading +228 votes)
• Ohio: reproductive rights amendment: 56.6% yes, 43.4% no; legalize recreational marijuana: 57.0% yes, 43.0% no.

We had two signs up in front of our house. Our mayoral favorite lost to the Koch money machine, but our school board pick won.

• Andrew Prokop: [11-08] 3 winners and 1 loser from Election Day 2023: "Democrats had a good night. So did abortion rights. Glenn Youngkin, not so much."

• Jamelle Bouie: [11-10] The GOP's culture war shtick is wearing thin with voters.

• Sarah Jones: [11-08] The anti-trans backlash failed last night.

• Ed Kilgore: [11-09] Are Democrats the party of low-turnout elections now? Too many wrong takes here to work through, but the idea that low voter turnout favored Republicans was largely established in 2010, when marginal Democrats who had landslided for Obama in 2008 stayed home, giving Republicans what seemed like an amazing rebound. Few people noticed that the 2010 turnout was almost exactly the same as 2006, which had been a huge Democratic wave, as Bush tanked post-Katrina, even pre-recession. Since 2010, Democrats have tried hard to increase voter turnout, and Republicans have worked even harder to suppress it. The West Coast, with high voter turnout mostly due to mail order, seemed to support the Democrats.

  In general, people who don't feel they have much stake in the system are the ones who don't vote, or don't vote regularly. Most of these people should align better economically with Democrats, but they often can't see that, and Democrats haven't worked very hard at winning them back -- at least since the 1980s, the focus has mainly been on raising money. Trump threw a monkey wrench into this: a lot of low-info, low-concern people like him for what we'll call aesthetic reasons, and that's boosted his vote totals, to where in 2016 and 2020 he ran about three points better than the "likely voter" polls, which got him way closer than he should have been, and helped Republicans overperform elsewhere. But I believe the underlying dynamic is a gradual shift from R-to-D, at least among regular voters (and young voters who are increasingly seeing voting as worth their time). This is being masked because Democrats still aren't very good at getting people to vote economic interests (although under Biden they've started to pay off), and Republicans are still very effective at lying to people and scheming behind their backs, and the media is way too generous to Republicans. On the other hand, Republican voter suppression often backfires. Philosophically, Democrats believe in high turnout, because they believe in democracy, where Republicans only believe in winning. So in most ways, the issue is probably a wash.

• Dion Lefler: [11-08] The $630,000 mayor: Can Lily Wu keep her boldest promises? While Democrats were enjoying wins elsewhere, here in Kansas we lost our mayor to a Koch-financed Republican dressed up as a Libertarian, checking off a lot of diversity boxes no one has come forward to brag about (female, non-white, immigrant from Guatemala, but also non-hispanic). Although the elections were technically non-partisan, Republicans claimed three seats -- with Wu, a majority -- on the Wichita City Council. Curiously enough, the School Board seats shifted to Democrats, including one at-large seat won by Melody McCrae-Miller.

• Charles P Pierce: [11-08] Ohio Republicans are already beefing with the will of the voters on abortion and weed: One thing you'll never hear a Republican say after a loss: "the people have spoken, and we have to heed their decision."

• Bill Scher: [11-08] Glenn Youngkin's big fat 15-week abortion ban belly flop.

• Li Zhou: [11-07] Andy Beshear offers Democrats some lessons for how to win in Trump country: "Here's how a Democrat won reelection in Kentucky."

The "third Republican presidential debate": We might as well split this out from the general morass of Republicanism, even though it did little more than exemplify it. I didn't watch, but my wife did, so I overheard a segment on foreign policy that was several orders of magnitude beyond bonkers.

• Andrew Prokop: [11-08] 0 winners and 5 losers from the third Republican presidential debate: "All the candidates failed, but they failed in different ways."

• Zack Beauchamp: [11-08] The Republican debate is fake.

• Jim Geraghty: [11-09] A sober GOP debate for serious times. Just as well Trump wasn't there. By far the silliest take on the debate.

• Ed Kilgore: [11-09] Republican debaters want to go to war with everyone (except Trump):

  Egged on by moderator Hugh Hewitt, a Navy-obsessed conservative pundit, all five candidates called for a lot more defense spending even as they railed against debts and deficits. To the extent they disagreed on foreign policy, it was mostly about whether defending or defunding Ukraine was the best tack for combating China. (Haley and Christie took the former position, while DeSantis and Ramaswamy took the latter.)

  Getting closer to home, there was total unanimity among the debaters on the need to ignore climate change and frantically resume uninhibited exploitation of fossil fuels. Haley called DeSantis a "liberal on the environment," forcing him to defend his determination to frack and drill until the icecaps fully melt.

  Ramaswamy played his anti-neocon card by dubbing Haley as "Dick Cheney in three-inch heels," then adding "we have two of them on stage," lest DeSantis feel left out, but Ramaswamy was an eager for war against China as any of them.

• Natalie Allison: [11-12] Tim Scott suspends his presidential campaign.

I generally hate it when people try to make a case by pointing out how a person looks, but I've been having a lot of trouble in following clips of Ramaswamy, not just because he's so nonsensical but because he doesn't seem to have a face behind the mouth that spouts such nonsense. Perhaps this is just something that happens with age, but it's not a problem I see with the other candidates (DeSantis has a face, although it's turned into a self-caricature, a different problem), or most other people. I'm looking at Salon as I write this, and even Ivanka (7 pictures) has some kind of face-in-progress. Her father (8 pictures) has a face, even if it's mostly buried in bronzer. Even Brian Kilmeade, staring as blankly as his brain, has a face. But Ramaswamy doesn't.

Trump, and other Republicans:

• Michelle Cottle: [11-08] What voters want that Trump seems to have: She beats around the bush a bit, but the ultimate point is that Republicans hate the other half of America, and they realize that the most effective way to express their hate is to restore Trump, given their understanding of how much their targets fear and loathe Trump. Trump's entire campaign so far is nothing but persecution complaints and revenge fantasies. No other Republican candidate, no matter how evil, comes close to challenging Trump in that regard.

  PS: Ok, I just jumped on the idea of Cottle's piece. Dean Baker read it and takes exception to the details: [11-08] Michelle Cottle makes up facts to push the Trump case: "I guess that New York Times columnists get to be condescending, out-of-touch jerks when they want to make their case. If they insist that people think the economy is awful, we can't let what people say get in the way."

• SV Date: [11-11] If progressives don't like Biden's Gaza position, wait till they learn about Trump's.

• David Freedlander: [11-10] Live with Rudy: "Indicted, isolated, and broke, Giuliani has one comfort left: the sound of his own voice."

• Marisa Iati/Isaac Arnsdorf: [11-11] Trump's rivals seize on opportunities to challenge his acuity.

• Laura Jedeed: [11-10] Inside Mike Johnson's ties to a far-right movement to gut the constitution.

• Ed Kilgore: [11-10] Speaker Johnson has one weird plan for avoiding a shutdown.

• Paul Krugman: [11-06] Why does the right hate America? Fair question, one that occurred to Krugman after reading Damon Linker's recent [11-04] Get to know the influential conservative intellectuals who help explain GOP extremism (which I cited last week, but mostly just took names). A glib but not inaccurate answer is: "because they hate our freedom" -- which seemed silly as an explanation for Islamic terrorism, but with these guys, their fear and loathing bleeds from every line. Sure, we on the left are more conscious of the freedom we're still denied, but any fair review of American history will remind us that everything in our history that we take pride in, at least as far back as "all men are created equal," came from the left, and was resisted by the right, same as today.

• Kelly McClure: [11-11] Ted Cruz blames extreme left for rise in antisemitism: Cruz was plugging his new book: Unwoke: How to Defeat Cultural Marxism in America. Quite an accomplishment. It's really hard to put that much stupid into such a short title.

• Charlie Savage/Maggie Haberman/Jonathan Swan: [11-11] Sweeping raids, giant camps and mass deportations: Inside Trump's 2025 immigration plans.

• Jack Shafer: [11-07] l Trump's recipe for a shockingly raw power grab. Starts with "plans on the first day of his new administration to invoke the Insurrection Act so he can dispatch the military to counter any demonstrations that might resist his policies." (See: Trump and allies plot revenge, Justice Department control in a second term.)

• Steven Shepard: [11-11] The power grabs that will determine control of Congress: "Partisan gerrymandering isn't new, but what's happening right now is far from normal."

• Michael Tomasky: [11-12] It's official: With "vermin," Trump is now using straight-up Nazi talk.

Biden and/or the Democrats:

• Jonathan Guyer: [11-09] More than 500 Biden campaign alumni want a Gaza ceasefire.

• Eric Levitz: [11-08] Do Democrats need to get less 'globalist'? Fairly long piece occasioned by the new John Judis/Ruy Teixeira book, Where Have All the Democrats Gone? Probably worth some thought, but the focus here is on trade (good for capitalists, not so much for workers) and migration (one way workers try to catch up), while skipping other aspects of international policy, such as war and climate. For more on this book:

  • Kenneth S Baer: [11-06] Where did the Democrats go wrong?

• Carlos Lozada: [11-11] A Trump-Biden rematch is the election we need.

• Andrew Marantz: [11-02] How Israel is splitting the Democrats. Isn't it basically between the politicians, who are virtually all on the take, and the base, who once again have every reason to suspect their leaders?

• Andrew Prokop: [11-09] Joe Manchin retires, making Democrats' brutal 2024 Senate map even more brutal. On the other hand, Manchin is still a possible presidential election spoiler, for which see Ed Kilgore: [11-09] Joe Manchin announces end of Senate career, new 2024 threat.

• Molly Redden: [11-09] 'The phone doesn't stop': Overwhelming demands for a cease-fire catch Democrats off guard.

Legal matters and other crimes:

• Ian Millhiser:

  • [11-06] A foolish state official may have just handed the NRA a big Supreme Court victory.

  • [11-07] The Supreme Court appears poised to rein in its worst decision on guns: Do domestic abusers really have a right to guns?

• Tensim Zekeria/Rebecca Crosby: [11-07] Criminalizing dissent: The RICO indictment of protesters against Cop City in Atlanta.

Climate and environment:

• Alex Harris/Ashley Miznazi: [11-05] King tide floods offer glimpse of Miami's soggy, salty future. I saw this in the Wichita Eagle today, which led me to more pieces:

  • Nathan Crabbe: [11-02] Climate change making king tide flooding more common; federal plan could require millions to buy flood insurance

  • Lizette Alvarez/Frances Robles: [2016-11-17] Intensified by climate change, 'king tides' change ways of life in Florida.

• Nathan J Robinson: [11-10] The climate crisis is slipping from the news right when it needs our attention most. This is the kind of idea that gets in the way of thinking, and for that matter communicating. It's not like climate crisis hasn't gotten any ink this year. Various storm and fire disasters have been front page a couple times each month, and statistical effects have been written up -- I don't think we've had a single month this year that wasn't among the hottest in history (usually number one), plus there's all the melting ice caps, the record high tides, etc. Sure, not enough is being done about it, and nowhere near fast enough, but that's a bigger political and economic quagmire, one that needs not just attention but a serious rethink. But how the hell's that going to happen when we can't even think our way out of a stupid, pointless, and extremely cruel war like Israel's?

Economic matters:

• Paul Krugman:

  • [11-07] Why did so many economists get disinflation wrong?

  • [11-09] What history tells us about the feel-bad economy.

• Eric Levitz: [11-12] 3 reasons Biden's strong economy is unpopular.

Ukraine War:

• Connor Echols: [11-10] Diplomacy Watch: Western pressure on Ukraine grows.

• Shane Harris/Isabelle Khurshudyan: [11-11] Ukrainian military officer coordinated Nord Stream pipeline attack: "Roman Chervinsky, a colonel in Ukraine's special operations forces, was integral to the brazen sabotage operation, say people familiar with planning." Still, questions remain:

  • Kelley Beaucar Vlahos: [11-12] Latest Nord Stream break: propaganda, patsy, or truth?

• William Hartung: [11-12] American arms makers, cashing in on conflict.

• David C Hendrickson: [11-08] Why do we let Israel and Ukraine wag the US dog? "In America's weird empire, dependents call the shots. Soon we will be suffering the consequences." I filed this under Ukraine rather than Israel to keep it from being buried in rubble, although the point is much clearer with Israel. The latter has a lot of political clout in the US, and has used that to mold American policy and to humble American political figures. Ukraine has no such clout, and has developed considerable antipathy from many Republicans. It seems most likely that Zelensky is simply doing what the US wants

• Ted Snider: [11-08] Is this the beginning of the end of the war in Ukraine? "The Western media is suddenly teeming with signs of fatigue and even . . . diplomacy?"

Around the world:

• Margaret Hartmann: [11-07] King Charles forced to deliver speech he hates. At this stage, ending the British monarchy would be an act of mercy.

Other stories:

Charles Hirschkind: [11-08] Exterminate the brutes: "Beneath the veneer of a celebrated concern for human rights, the racism that defined 19th century colonialism continues to provide the dominant lens through which the West exercises the subordination of non-Western populations." Another piece about Israel, but I thought I should give it a little distance.

Matthew Hoh: [11-10] Armistice Day and the empire: A name change and the catastrophe that followed. It's now Veterans Day, November 11, signifying not the arrival of peace (after WWI) but the endless waste of war.

Yarden Katz: [11-09] Are Israelis Jews? Returning to Jewish minority life: Argues that "Israel has erased the Jewish people and destroyed the possibilities for Jews to live in Palestine as non-colonizers. 'Israeli' is a colonial identity we should renounce, because it harms both Palestinians and Jews." Interesting attempt to drive a wedge between identities Jewish and Israeli, then flip them over. Nothing is quite that simple.

Jeremy Kuzmarov: [11-10] How Bill Clinton set the groundwork for today's foreign policy disasters. Co-author, with John Marciano, of a book I should have noted when it appeared in 2018: The Russians Are Coming, Again: The First Cold War as Tragedy, the Second as Farce; also Obama's Unending Wars: Fronting the Foreign Policy of the Permanent Warfare State (2019); and forthcoming: Warmonger: How Clinton's Malign Foreign Policy Launched the US Trajectory From Bush II to Biden.

Keren Landman: [11-09] It's getting increasingly dangerous to be a newborn in the US. A big part of this seems to be: Alice Miranda Ollstein: [11-07] Congenital syphilis jumped tenfold over the last decade.[

Michaelangelo Matos: [11-05] Documentary review: 'The War on Disco': I accidentally saw a bit of this show, but didn't stick around long enough to evaluate Matos on the subject (although I know him to be one of the best dance-oriented critics around). I always thought the anti-disco rants in the 1970s were more stupid than racist (although what finally shut them up were disco hits by Blondie and New Order, so go figure).

Nathan J Robinson: [09-19] Is Thomas Sowell a legendary "maverick" intellectual or a pseudo-scholarly propagandist? Asking the question practically answers itself. One more in a long series of profiles in right-wing mind-rot.

Aja Romano: [11-10] What the Hasan Minhaj controversy says about the trouble with storytelling.

Robert Sherrill: [1988-06-11] William F. Buckley lived off evil as mold lives off garbage: An archive piece, by one of my favorite journalists fifty years ago, a review of John B Judis: William F Buckley, Jr: Patron Saint of the Conservatives. Sherrill's title bears structural resemblance to his book, Military Justice Is to Justice as Military Music Is to Music.

Alissa Wilkinson: [11-09] The long, long Hollywood strikes have ended.

Music Week

Expanded blog post, November archive (in progress).

Tweet: Music Week: 30 albums, 8 A-list

Music: Current count 41108 [41078] rated (+30), 28 [32] unrated (-4).

I had a bunch of things I wanted to get done before this update, and I have damn little to show for it. A bunch of things happened, or didn't happen, last week, but if I try to go into that, it'll be days more before I post anything. Maybe next week I can explain.

Meanwhile. I did write another long Speaking of Which, which didn't come out until Monday, pushing Music Week back a day. Rather than wrote more on that here, let me recommend a book about a different time and world that strikes me as especially relevant here: Nicholson Baker's Human Smoke, a chronicle of the prehistory of WWII told through contemporary newspaper clippings: written by the last people who had to figure out the Nazis without having the benefit of knowing how the story ends.

One of my distractions last week was figuring out a sequel for my Oct. 27 birthday dinner. I had shopped for a lot of tapas dishes that I didn't have time to make, so we had a second setting a week later (so Nov. 3). I promised last week to write up my notes on the birthday dinner. I finally did this in the notebook. I also looked up some previous Spanish-themed dinners, and came up with a couple of old pics.

I also finished the indexing on October Streamnotes.

One thing I made very little progress on was setting up the 18th Annual Francis Davis Jazz Poll. I hoped to be able to say more about that here, but that will have to wait until next week. It is still a go, and I hope to send ballot invites out by Nov. 15 (hopefully not much later). Big issue right now is trying to figure out who to invite. I'm surprised as how frazzled I already feel.

Another thing I didn't get done was setting up my EOY files, broken out between jazz and non-jazz (as in previous years -- oops, already have links there to my useless stubs).

The distractions took time away from listening, but the extra day got the rating count up to 30, including five A-list items from my demo queue (a lot more than usual). Would have had six had I gotten to Aruán Ortiz in time.

New records reviewed this week:

• Rodrigo Amado/The Bridge: Beyond the Margins (2022 [2023], Trost): [cd]: A
• Darcy James Argue's Secret Society: Dynamic Maximum Tension (2023, Nonesuch): [sp]: B+(***)
• Bruce Barth Trio: Dedication (2021 [2022], Origin): [sp]: B+(**)
• Rob Brown: Oceanic (2021 [2023], RogueArt): [cdr]: B+(***)
• Rob Brown: Oblongata (2022 [2023], RogueArt): [cdr]: A-
• Buck 65: Punk Rock B-Boy (2023, self-released): [bc]: A
• DJ Shadow: Action Adventure (2023, Mass Appeal): [sp]: B+(*)
• Kurt Elling: SuperBlue: The London Sessions (2022, Edition, EP): [bc]: B+(*)
• Kurt Elling/Charlie Hunter/Neal Smith: SuperBlue: Guilty Pleasures (Edition, EP) **
• Kurt Elling/Charlie Hunter: SuperBlue: The Iridescent Spree (2023, Edition): [sp]: B
• Robert Finley: Black Bayou (2023, Easy Eye Sound): [sp]: B+(**)
• Sue Foley: Live in Austin Vol. 1 (2023, Stony Plain): [sp]: B+(**)
• Lafayette Gilchrist: Undaunted (2022 [2023], Morphius): [sp]: B+(**)
• Hermanos Gutiérrez: El Bueno Y El Malo (2022, Easy Eye Sound): [sp]: A-
• William Hooker: Flesh and Bones (2023, Org Music): [sp]: B+(**)
• Russell Kranes/Alex Levine/Sam Weber/Jay Sawyer: Anchor Points (2022 [2023], OA2): [cd]: B+(**)
• Lil Wayne: Tha Fix Before Tha VI (2023, Young Money): [sp]: B
• Myra Melford's Fire and Water Quintet: Hear the Light Singing (2022 [2023], RogueArt): [cd]: A-
• Joshua Moshe: Inner Search (2022 [2023], La Sape): [sp]: B+(**)
• David Murray/Questlove/Ray Angry: Plumb (2022 [2023], Outside In Music): [sp]: A-
• Remembrance Quintet: Do You Remember? (2023, Sonboy): [sp]: B+(***)
• Sampha: Lahai (2023, Young): [sp]: B+(*)
• Jeff Sanford's Cartoon Jazz Orchestra: Playland at the Beach (2023, Little Village): [sp]: B+(**)
• Jeremy Udden: Wishing Flower (2023, Sunnyside): [sp]: B+(*)
• Miki Yamanaka: Shades of Rainbow (2023, Cellar Music): [sp]: B+(**)

Recent reissues, compilations, and vault discoveries:

• Barry Altschul/David Izenson/Perry Robinson: Stop Time: Live at Prince Street, 1978 (1978 [2023], NoBusiness): [cd]: A-
• Peter Brötzmann/Sabu Toyozumi: Triangle: Live at Ohm, 1987 (1987 [2023], NoBusiness): [cd]: B+(***)
• Roy Campbell/William Parker/Zen Matsuura: Visitation of Spirits: The Pyramid Trio Live, 1985 (1985 [2023], NoBusiness): [cd]: A-
• Kim Dae Hwan/Choi Sun Bae: Korean Fantasy (1999 [2023], NoBusiness): [cd]: B+(***)

Old music:

• None.

Unpacking: Found in the mail last week:

• Rodrigo Amado/The Bridge: Beyond the Margins (Trost) [10-20]
• Les McCann: Never a Dull Moment! Live From Coast to Coast 1966-1967 (Resonance, 2CD) [12-01]
• John Paul McGee: A Gospejazzical Christmas (Jazz Urbano) [11-16]
• Wes Montgomery/Wynton Kelly Trio: Maximum Swing: The Unissued 1965 Half Note Recordings (Resonance, 2CD)
• Dave Stryker: Groove Street (Strikezone) [01-24]
• Trio Grande: Urban Myth (Whirlwind) [11-03]

Speaking of Which

Blog link.

Again, I swore off working on this during the week, which turned out to pose more than a few problems. Finally opened the file up on Saturday evening. I figured I'd just collect links, and not bother with any serious writing. The supply of inputs seemed endless, and it got late Sunday before I considered tidying up and posting. But I couldn't, due to a computer problem which took several hours to diagnose and about a minute to fix once I recognized it (DHCP tripped me up). By then it was too late, so my posts are shifted back a day once more.

Starting up today, I didn't go back to website I had previously visited, but I did have a few more to look up. I also remembered the Gabriel Winant piece at the bottom, so I dug it up, and wasted a couple hours thinking about those quotes, before I scrapped what little I had written.

Top story threads:

Israel: With more patience, these could have been grouped into a half-dozen (maybe 8-10) subcategories, of which genocide (both actual and imagined) looms large, with significant growth in cease-fire advocacy and repression of anyone favoring cease-fire. The short category is actual military news: Israel has conducted ground operations in northern Gaza for a week, but what they've achieved (or for that matter attempted) isn't at all clear, while Palestinian casualties are continuing to increase, but I haven't made much sense out of the numbers.

It does appear that I underestimated the ability of Hamas to continue fighting after their initial suicidal attack was beaten back. Not by a lot, mind you, but they've continued to shoot occasional rockets (nothing you could describe as a "flood," and Israel regularly boasts of shooting 80-90% of them down, so the effect is likely near-zero), and they're offering some degree of ground resistance. Still, a unilateral Israeli cease-fire would almost certainly halt the war, the killing, the destruction. Given that continued punishment just generates future violence, Israel's unwillingness to call a halt to this genocide -- and that's still the operative term, even if Netanyahu hasn't convened his Wannsee Conference yet -- signals only the intent to fight to some kind of Endlösung ("final solution"). I might be tempted to ditch the Nazi references, but they are ones that Israelis understand clearly -- and, one hopes, uncomfortably.

Some of the more purely partisan digs wound up in the sections on Republicans and Democrats. Given that the entire American political establishment is totally in thrall to Israel and their right-wing donor cabal, there's little (if any) substance in these pieces, just a lot of chattering nonsense.

• Yuval Abraham: [10-30] Expel all Palestinians from Gaza, recommends Israeli gov't ministry.

• Ray Acheson: [10-17] We must end violence to end violence.

• Paula Andres: [11-04] Israel bombs ambulance convoy near Gaza's largest hospital.

• Jeremy Appel: [11-03] Israel rabbi describes settler rampages across West Bank.

• Michael Arria: [11-05] The largest Palestine protest in US history shut down the streets of DC: "An estimated 300,000 demonstrators in the largest Palestine protest in United States history, calling for a ceasefire and an end to the genocide in Gaza." Also note:

  • James North: [10-28] Mainstream media ignores massive civil disobedience for Palestine that shut down New York's Grand Central Station.

• James Bamford: [11-02] Why Israel slept: I don't care much for the metaphor here. There will be recriminations for Israel's security lapses on Oct. 7, because it's easy to pick on exposed flaws, but Israel's containment of Gaza has been vigilant and remarkably effective for many years, and their response to the breach was swift and decisive, and the damage, while far above what they were accustomed to, was really fairly minor. They could just as well be congratulating themselves, but would rather channel the outrage into a far greater assault. But this article is actually about something else: "Netanyahu's war inside the United States." More specifically, "Netanyahu's move to counter the protesters with lots of money to buy political power in Washington to create laws making it a crime to boycott Israel." It may seem paradoxical that as Israel has been steadily losing public support in America and Europe, they've been able to lock political elites into even more subservient roles. Bamford takes the obvious tack here: follow the money.

• Ramzy Baroud: [11-03] 'Turning Gaza into ashes': Israeli hasbara vs the world.

• Nicolas Camut: [11-05] Israel minister suspended after calling nuking Gaza an option: "Heritage Minister Amichai Eliyahu's statements 'are not based in reality,' Prime Minister Netanyahu says."

• Christian Caryl/Damir Marusic: [11-02] Should Israel agree to a ceasefire? Commentators weigh in. Starts with Yossi Beilin, who was the only successful negotiator in the Oslo Peace Process, disappoints with "a humanitarian pause, but no more." He never negotiated with Hamas, and never will, which may be why the deals he came "so close to" never materialized. If you refuse to negotiate with your fiercest enemies, you'll never settle anything.

  James Jeffrey says no, insisting that Israel is fighting an "existential war" with Hamas, placing it "within a larger struggle involving its enemy Iran instigating conflicts in Lebanon, Syria and Yemen as well as Gaza -- a world war scenario he sees as like Pearl Harbor.

  Yaakov Katz insists "a cease-fire would be a victory for Hamas." That's hard to see, even if the ceasefire took place immediately after Israel repelled the attacks and resealed the breach: Hamas depleted most of their missile supply, and lost 1,000 or more of their best fighters (about 2.5% of the highest estimate I've seen of their force), in a surprise attack that will be many times harder to repeat in the future. And that was before Israel killed another 10,000 Palestinians in fit of collective punishment, suggesting their real intent is genocide.

  Lawrence Freedman and Matt Duss have more doubts about what Israel can do, and more worries for Israel's reputation, and a better grasp of the larger picture. Palestinians Ahmed Alnaouq and Laila El-Haddad are the only ones who actually sense the human dimensions of the slaughter.

• Isaac Chotiner: [11-01] The Gaza-ification of the West Bank: Interview with Hagai El-Ad, of B'Tselem.

• Fabiola Cineas: [10-31] "History repeating itself": How the Israel-Hamas war is fueling hate against Muslims and Jews: "There's a surge in reports of assaults, vandalism, harassment, and intimidation." Two points that should be stressed more: one is that Zionism has always been predicated on, and fed by, antisemitism, and as such, Israel has often worked to incite antisemitism to motivate Jews to immigrate (the pre-Israel Zionist International negotiated with antisemites, especially in England, to sponsor "a Jewish homeland," and with Nazi Germany to relieve them of their Jews; after independence, Mossad ran various operations in Arab countries to panic Jews into emigrating); in constantly blaming any and all criticism of Israel on antisemitism, Israel is taunting its critics into false generalizations. Author has a section called "Antisemitism was already on the rise." This combines two different things: the classic European prejudice (whether Christian or racist), which became more public with Trump's election; and naive reaction against Israel's inhumanity to Arabs (Jewish and/or leftist critics of Israel are usually careful not to generalize Israelis or Zionists with non-Israeli Jews). Neither is excusable. But it's much easier to educate the naifs than to deprogram the Nazis. Also note that most classic antisemites are enthusiastic supporters of Israel.

• Steve Coll: [10-30] The plight of the hostages and the rapidly escalating crisis in Gaza: "Never before has Israel sought to rescue so many hostages from a territory where it is also waging an unbridled aerial war." Hostage negotiations are always fraught with overtones, but a big factor here is that Israel's leaders are much more into the air (and now ground) war, which they control, than the hostages, which require some measure of empathy, tact and compromise (characteristics they pride themselves in not showing, especially when geared up for war). A hostage family member asks: "Why this offensive? There is no rush. Hamas wasn't going anywhere." But any pause to the war risks derailing it, letting the fever cool, and the madness be reflected upon. They can't quite admit it, but Israel's leaders would be happier if Hamas just killed all the hostages. That they could spin into more war.

• Jonathan Cook: [11-03] Mounting evidence suggests Israel may be ready to 'cleanse' Gaza. The "Greater Gaza" plan has been kicking around for a while, at least since 2014, and the "Jordan is Palestine" idea goes way back.

• Ryan Cooper: [11-03] A one-state solution could work in Israel: "But the end of South African apartheid demonstrates it would take an Israeli commitment to peace that is nowhere in evidence." Could work, sure, but any chance is long off, and receding as the right-wing has become more obviously genocidal. One problem is numbers: shedding Gaza would help there, a single-state for the rest is probably where you'd wind up, but it is a long ways toward equal rights. The bigger problem is that Israel is not just a garden-variety white (racist) settler state. It has a lot of trauma-and-hubris-induced psychological baggage that will take ages to overcome.

• Alex De Waal: [11-03] How the Israel-Hamas war is destabilizing the Horn of Africa.

• Rajaa Elidrissi: [11-01] The Gaza Strip blockade, explained.

• Richard Falk: [11-03] Israel-Palestine war: Israel's endgame is much more sinister than restoring 'security'.

• Lynn Feinerman: [11-03] The left as Israel's sacrificial lamb: "One of the tragic ironies of this is the vast majority of the casualties were kibbutzim and the people at this outdoor concert. And people who live in kibbutzim and people who go to raves tend to be the more left-wing, secular Israelis who oppose Netanyahu." But the dead are now martyrs for the far right, which isn't just ironic. Socialism built Israel into a strong, cohesive community, but the doctrine of "Hebrew Labor" was the rotten kernel at their heart, which grew the apartheid war-state of today.

• Gabriella Ferrigine: [11-01] Graham declares "no limit" of Palestinian deaths would make him question Israel.

• Laura Flanders: [10-30] "Why I resigned from the State Department": Interview with Josh Paul, who had worked in the section that oversees transfers of military equipment and support. [I cited another interview with Paul last week, from Politico. The title bears repeating: 'There are options for Israel that do not involve killing thousands of civilians'.

• Robert Givens: [11-02] Block to block in Gaza: What will an Israeli invasion look like?

• Michelle Goldberg: [11-04] When it comes to Israel, who decides what you can and can't say?

• Jonathan Guyer: [11-04] Will an Israel-Hamas ceasefire happen? The reasons and roadblocks, explained.

• Benjamin Hart: [11-04] Egypt's puzzling role in the Israel-Hamas war: "The country that used to control the Gaza Strip is helping Palestinians -- but only up to a point." Interview with Steven Cook, a Foreign Policy columnist.

• Amira Hass: [11-01] Amid the mourning, Israel's settlement enterprise celebrates a great victory: "The soldiers are accompanying the settlers on their raids -- or even finishing the job for them."

• Michael Horton: [10-30] Houthi missile launches at Israel risk reigniting war in Yemen.

• Scott Horton/Connor Freeman: [10-31] Netanyahu's support for Hamas has backfired: Nah! He's got Hamas right where he wants them. If your goal is to destroy every last vestige of Palestine, the first thing you have to do is to make Palestinians unsympathetic. Israel never feared Palestinian violence, because that they could meet in kind, plus an order of magnitude. Israel's great fear was (and is) Palestinian civility.

• Ellen Ioanes: [11-04] Iran could determine how far the Israel-Hamas war spreads. I rather doubt this. Since the revolution in 1979, Iran has attempted to increase its political influence among Shiite factions in Arab countries, with some success in Lebanon and Yemen, but not in Saudi Arabia or the Persian Gulf states, nor in Iraq until the US busted the country in 2003. But at least up to 1990, Iran maintained a cozy relationship with Israel, having never shown any particular interest in Palestinian groups (which were either too secular, or in Hamas, too Sunni). It was Israel that pivoted to being anti-Iran, most likely playing on American prejudices going back to the hostage crisis. Since then, Iran has been a convenient whipping boy for Israel, but despite all the nuclear talk, they never have been a serious threat to each other. As for Hezbollah, Iran does support them, but there's no reason to think Iran calls the shots. Even if they did, attacking Israel makes little sense. The upshot of the 2006 war was that Israel can do serious air damage to Lebanon, well beyond Hezbollah's stronghold in the south, but Hezbollah can still fend off a ground invasion. And Israel has better things to do than that. Of course, if such a war was a serious consideration, the simplest solution would be for the US to normalize relations with Iran. But who in Washington can get Israel's permission to do that? Also on Hezbollah:

  • Nicole Narea: [11-03] Hezbollah's role in the Israel-Hamas war, explained. Key point is that while Hezbollah was formed to fight Israel's occupation of southern Lebanon (1982-2000), it has since become a mainstream political party, with a stake in the government of Lebanon. While part of their credibility is their ability to defend against Israel, it would be silly to risk that by having to fight again. The option of moving into mainstream politics has made Hezbollah less of a terror threat. Hamas was denied that option: when they ran for office, and won, they were denied recognition, so in Gaza they fought back and took control, only to be blockaded. The result is that the only way Hamas could act was by force, hence the military wing took charge. And Israel did that deliberately, because they don't fear Hamas militarily, but they do fear Hamas politically. They want Palestinian "leaders" who will do their bidding, who will keep their charges in line, and line their own pockets, and let Israel do whatever Israelis want to do.

  • Ali Rizk: [10-31] Why Hezbollah doesn't want a full-scale war. Yet.

  • Ellen Ioanes: [11-05] Israel hits civilian infrastructure as ceasefire calls grow.

• Arnold Isaacs: [11-02] War in a post-fact world. Or: "War, crimes, truth, and denial: unthinkable thoughts and false memories."

• David D Kirkpatrick/Adam Rasgon: [10-30] The Hamas propaganda war: "Across the Arab world, the group is successfully selling its narrative of resistance." Hard for me to gauge, as Hamas has no respect or legitimacy here -- even though a narrative of devout patriots fighting back against overwhelmingly powerful alien oppressors would strike chords many Americans would sympathize with. (One might think of Red Dawn, or maybe just Star Wars.) But elsewhere, the story is bound to resonate, especially among people (and not just Arabs or Muslims) who have directly felt the heavy hand of imperialism. Even if Israel is amazingly successful in their campaign to obliterate Gaza, the most likely future scenario is a return to 1970s-style terrorist disruption (the desperation of a not-quite "utterly defeated people" and a few others who romanticize their struggle).

• Keren Landman: [11-01] The death toll from Gaza, explained: Not very well, I'm afraid. The link to Btselem's database says "Data updated until October 5." The number of Palestinians killed is similar to the number killed since Oct. 7. The number of Israelis killed is rather less than the 1,400 on or shortly after Oct. 7. I still haven't been able to find a day-by-day accounting -- Wikipedia offers some totals to whenever the file was updated, and some detail, especially on foreign nationals on the Israeli side. Given that fighting outside Gaza ended by the second day -- Israel claimed to have killed all of the Palestinian attackers (counting over 1,000), and the breach was resealed -- virtually all subsequent deaths have been due to Israeli bombardment of Gaza.

• Chris Lehman: [11-02] American evangelicals await the final battle in Gaza.

• Louisa Loveluck/Susannah George/Michael Birnbaum: [11-05] As Gaza death toll soars, secrecy shrouds Israel's targeting process.

• Branko Marcetic: [11-03] A tidal wave of state and private repression is targeting pro-Palestinian voices. Probably enough on this for a whole section, but a cluster of pieces landed here together:

  • Ben Burgis: [11-03] A pro-Israel Super PAC is smearing Rashida Tlaib for standing up for Palestinian lives.

  • Daniel Finn: [10-31] Rashid Khalidi: "We are seeing a horrifying attempt to shut down speech around Palestine": Interview with Khalidi.

  • Deborah Leter: [10-31] France steps up crackdown on Palestine solidarity amid Gaza war.

  • Calder McHugh: [11-04] 'It feels like the new McCarthyism': How the Israel-Hamas war is redefining the limits of free speech.

  • Jonathan Shamir: [10-26] An anti-Palestinian crackdown across Europe.

• Aaron Maté: [11-02] In Gaza, Biden is an equal partner in Israel's mass murder.

• Harold Meyerson: [11-02] The co-dependency of Bibi and Hamas: Some false equivalency here, followed by a plea for ye olde two-state solution that is certain to fall on deaf ears. Sure, Netanyahu and Hamas are ideal enemies for each other, especially relative to other factions in their constituencies. But there is a big difference: Israel is winning, at least within the narrow confines of war, while Hamas is losing -- and Israel hopes, bad enough to sink all Palestinians.

• Fintan O'Toole: [10-31] No endgame in Gaza: "After weeks of bombardment and thousands of deaths, what are Netanyahu's political and ethical limits?" I'll be surprised if Netanyahu has any.

• Paul R Pillar: [11-01] With world's focus on Gaza, West Bank conflict brews: "Settlers there appear freer than ever to commit violence against Palestinians, risking a new intifada -- which was already a possibility before Hamas's Oct. 7 attack."

• Nathan J Robinson: [11-03] What every American should know about Gaza: "We are complicit in the bombing of Palestinian civilians and have an obligation to pressure our government to push for a cease-fire."

• Natasha Roth-Rowland: [10-28] When 'never again' becomes a war cry: "In an Israeli war that has been retrofitted onto a Holocaust template, it is obscene that a plea to stop further killing is now read as moral failure."

• Sigal Samuel: [11-01] Israel's crackdown on dissent will only hurt it: "Silencing criticism makes it harder for Israel's leaders to think clearly." Note that most of the examples of repression are in America. "America would have benefited from listening to dissenters after 9/11; instead, it silenced them."

• Dahlia Scheindlin: [11-03] Here's the least bad option for Gaza after the war ends: "Reoccupation by Israel? Putting the Palestinian Authority in charge? A Kosovo-style international intervention would be less bad than both of those." This is similar to the scheme I wrote up last week, except mine offered a cleaner break from Israel -- which would, I think, be better both for Gaza and for Israel, whereas Kosovo is still saddled with Serbia's claim on the territory. (The same problem of competing claims affects other de facto breakaway territories, especially in the former Soviet Union.) The UN has (well, most plausibly) the legitimacy and the skills to organize an interim government in Gaza, assuming no significant party opposes them. Israel would initially have to agree to this, and honor that (although I allowed them to retaliate for any post-truce strikes, since they think they're entitled to do that anyway; my guess is that if Israel is out of the picture, that scenario ends). Then the "militants" in Gaza would have to agree to let the UN come in and take over. I expect they would do that because: (a) doing so would allow aid to flow in; (b) they couldn't be prosecuted for anything they did before the truce; and (c) the intent would be for the UN-established government to hold and honor democratic elections in short order. There are more possible angles to this, but one advantage Gaza has over Kosovo is that there is no internal ethnic or religious conflict to settle. So, once Israel is willing to relinquish its claims and interests -- and let's face it, Israel has no good ideas of its own here -- this sort of thing might not be so hard to do.

• Tali Shapiro/Jonathan Ofir: [11-05] Israeli doctors urge the bombing of Gaza hostpirals.

• Richard Silverstein:

  • [10-30] Gaza: Language of genocide: Illustration is a poster for "Ceasefire Now: End the Siege on Gaza." It includes a number of quotes, highlighting this one: "If I die, remember that I, we, were individuals, we had names, dreams, and achievements and our only fault was that we were classified as inferior."

  • [11-04] Israel's 'total war' strategy in Gaza: "First time in recent history a nation waged a war of extermination in an urban environment."

  • [11-05] Germany criminalizes calling Gaza a genocide.

  • [11-05] Israel proposes expulsion of hundreds of thousands of Gazans as 'humanitarian initiative'.

• Oliver Stuenkel: [] The West can't defend international law while also supporting genocide: I wasn't aware that the US took any interest in international law any more.

• Liz Theoharis: [11-05] A cycle of escalating violence.

• Nahal Toosi: [11-04] The U N is in disarray over the Israel-Hamas war.

• Zeynep Tufecki: [10-31] Past lies about war in the Middle East are getting in the way of the truth today. Colin Powell is the poster boy here. Old news but worth repeating:

  But if the U.S. response after Sept. 11 is a model, it is as a model of what not to do.

  After the attacks, the United States received deep global sympathy. Many Muslims around the world were furious about this blemish upon Islam, even if they opposed U.S. policies: Citizens held vigils, politicians condemned the attacks and clerics repudiated them in mosque sermons. (The idea that Muslims widely celebrated the attacks has been repeatedly shown to be false or traces back to a few instances of dubious clarity.)

  But, instead of mobilizing that widespread global sympathy to try to isolate the extremists, the United States chose to wage a reckless and destructive war in Iraq, driven by an impulsive desire for vengeance and justified by falsehoods about weapons of mass destruction.

• Edward Wong/Patrick Kingsley: [11-05] U.S. officials fear American guns ordered by Israel could fuel West Bank violence.

• Oren Ziv: [10-31] Risking arrest and assault, Israelis begin protesting Gaza war.

• Mairav Zonszwin: [11-01] Israel and Palestine's existential war: Given that "genocide" is so actively bandied about, the existential risks for Palestinians are obvious. For Israel, the threat is harder to gauge. Israel could have done essentially nothing after the first day's repairs, and would still be as secure as ever behind their "iron walls." What Hamas hurt was their ego, their sense of power. But since they can kill and destroy with impunity, that's reason enough for them. Nothing existential to it, unless you think maybe they have a soul to lose?

Trump, and other Republicans:

• Lauren Aratani: [11-04] Trump family on trial: five takeaways from a week in the New York fraud case.

• Isaac Arnsdorf/Josh Dawsey/Devlin Barrett: [11-05] Trump and allies plot revenge, Justice Department control in a second term: "Advisers have also discussed deploying the military to quell potential unrest on Inauguration Day."

• Dan Froomkin: [10-26] As Republicans embrace theocratic authoritarianism, the political media is tongue-tied.

• Greg Grandin: [11-01] The Republicans who want to invade Mexico.

• Sarah Jones: [11-02] Republicans for war crimes.

• Cameron Joseph: [11-03] Is Tommy Tuberville the most ignorant man in DC? Also:

  • Nia Prater: [11-02] Senate Republicans are finally sick of Tommy Tuberville.

• Daniel Larison: [10-31] Ron DeSantis's foreign policy speech was a real dud: "He wants to invoke a weariness of war and anti-neocon sentiment, but ends up promoting the policies of both." This sounds like garden-variety Republican gibberish: Democrats weak and feckless, me tough, China bad, but will cower when faced with real American resolve, and even more ridiculous "defense" spending.

• Michael E Mann: [11-05] Trump 2.0: The climate cannot survive another Trump term.

• Heather Digby Parton:

  • [11-01] Trump's kids take the stand in NY fraud trial -- but only Ivanka matters.

  • [11-03] Trump's purge begins -- with the Federalist Society.

• Robert Reich: [10-27] No Labels is a front group for Donald Trump: I rarely bother with Reich, but this title hit my extremely literal brain head on. Suppose that's exactly what it is: a backup plan to put Trump on the ballot if he doesn't get the Republican nomination. How else can Trump manage to get on enough state ballots late in the cycle? The result would be a bloodbath split with the official Republican nominee, much like 1912 between Theodore Roosevelt and William Taft, but Trump would see that as a totally justifiable price if the Republicans betrayed him, and could use it as a threat to keep it from happening.

• Joseph Solis-Mullen: [10-23] Republican solutions would destabilize Central America, not fix it.

• Adriene Mahsa Varkiani: [11-03] House Republicans introduce bill to expel Palestinians from the country.

• Li Zhou: [11-02] The House Israel aid bill is a reminder that Trump-aligned Republicans are now in charge: "Now they've passed an aid package tailored to their goals." For more on those goals, and more on their author:

  • Paul Krugman: [11-02] Israel, the IRS and the big grift: "Holding national security hostage to help tax cheats."

  • David Firestone: [11-01] Mike Johnson just confirmed how unserious he is.

  • Charles M Blow: [11-01] I grew up in Mike Johnson's district, where kindness can mask cruelty.

  • David French: [11-05] 'MAGA Mike Johnson' and our broken Christian politics.

  • Ed Kilgore: [11-03] Does Mike Johnson even want to avoid a government shutdown?

  • Charles P Pierce: [11-06] The thing with the son and the porn 'accountability' software isn't even today's weirdest Mike Johnson story: "He was also apparently the dean of a law school that never had any students."

Biden and/or the Democrats:

• Nick French: [09-01] If Democrats want to win elections, they should bring back the Covid welfare state: "By many measures, Bidenomics is working great -- but most Americans are still down on the economy. That's in large part because the U.S. government let its temporarily generous social safety net unravel."

• Melvin Goodman: [11-03] Biden endorses the "indispensable nation" notion: Sorry, couldn't help but edit that title a bit (for clarity, you understand). Biden's words were: "American leadership is what holds the world together. American alliances are what keep us, America, safe." Then he worked in "beacon to the world" and explicitly cited "my friend Madeleine Albright."

• David Klion:

  • [11-01] Memo to Biden: Israel and Ukraine are not the same.

  • [11-03] People are urging Bernie Sanders to back a Gaza cease-fire. Here's why he hasn't.

• Robert Kuttner: [11-01] Biden's Nakba: "The catastrophic effects of the president's indulgence of Netanyahu." This seems like a fair description of Netanyahu's proposition (and its odds):

  Netanyahu's notion that first Hamas can be destroyed at acceptable cost, and then someone else can be found to govern Gaza, and then some kind of regional settlement can be achieved is lunacy. This has become Biden's war. Now it has to be Biden's peace, starting with much tougher constraints on Israel.

• Ahmed Moor: [11-01] I can no longer justify voting for Joe Biden in 2024.

• Holly Otterbein: [11-05] Dem fears mount amid Biden's polling slump and Israel backlash: I tried to ignore the chatter about Sunday's New York Times/Sienna College Poll (which they've since played up with updates and analysis, with more by Nate Cohn), but I figured I could (and should) kick him again over Israel. Also, while it's easy enough to explain this poll away, some skeptics are using it to question the wisdom of "staying the course" (e.g., Now do you believe me?).

• Pamela Paul: [11-02] The Democrats are their own worst enemies: Lots of ways one can play that title -- I'm tempted to quote a country song, "if you don't stand for something, you'll fall for anything at all" -- but I don't have time to sink here. Suffice it to note that this is a review of the new John B Judis/Ruy Teixeira book, Where Have All the Democrats Gone? You probably don't remember their 2002 book, The Emerging Democratic Majority, which Paul initially remembers as "hugely influential" then dismisses as "failed prophecy."

Legal matters and other crimes:

• Ryan Cooper: [11-01] The culture of corporate criminal impunity continues: "Attorney General Merrick Garland continues to let big companies skate."

• Steven Lubet: [11-02] Why this gift to Clarence Thomas is the worst: "Behold the sweetheart loan for a gilded motorcoach which the Supreme Court justice failed to disclose."

• Ian Millhiser: [11-03] The Supreme Court will hear a case that could effectively legalize automatic weapons: Bump stocks.

• Andrew Prokop: [10-30] The fraught debate over whether the 14th Amendment disqualifies Trump, explained. IANAL, but personally I don't think it does, and I don't think it should. But Trump's recent rhetoric declaring convicted rioters, including some convicted of seditious conspiracy, to be not just political prisoners but hostages, and his promises to pardon all of them, make the case more credible.

Ukraine War:

• Blaise Malley: [11-03] Diplomacy Watch: Ukrainian commander admits war is 'stalemate': "But despite battlefield realities and political dynamics, talks of negotiations still 'taboo' in Kyiv."

• Lauren Irwin: [11-05] Zelensky invites Trump to Ukraine so he can educate the former president about the reality of the war. Ok, this one is funny. Not just the notion that it might be possible to educate Trump about anything, let alone a war Trump insists he "can manage it and finish the war" in 24 hours. But funnier still is that if he went, he'd certainly violate one or more of his bail conditions.

• David Sacks: [11-01] Zelensky: TIME may be on his side, but real time, isn't: "Official Ukraine narrative collapses as Zelensky's inner circle admits to magazine that the war cannot be won militarily." Bullet points:

  • Ukraine's war aims are unrealistic.
  • Staggering casualties have decimated the Ukrainian army.
  • Conscription policies are draconian.
  • Morale is collapsing.
  • Corruption is uncontrollable.

• Ted Snider: [11-02] Volodymr Zelensky is in a sea of troubles.

Other stories:

Dean Baker:

• [10-25] Fighting billionaires' control of the media, individual news vouchers.

• [11-01] The death of Ady Barkan, a great organizer and great human being.

David Dayen: [10-18] The NIH's 'how to become a billionaire' program: "An obscure company affiliated with a former NIH employee is offered an exclusive license for a government-funded cancer drug."

Ethan Iverson: [10-30] Louis Armstrong's last word.

Paul Krugman: [10-31] The military-industrial-complex: He has a chart arguing that as a share of GDP, military spending is down since Eisenhower's speech, a long-term trend with bumps for Vietnam, Reagan, and Iraq, as well as blips when spending held steady while the economy crashed (2008, 2020). For a counterpoint, see William Hartung: [11-03] What Paul Krugman gets wrong about the military industrial complex. It seems to me that Eisenhower's concern wasn't the money per se, but the evolution of arms industries from mere suppliers to a political force that would make wars more (not less) likely.

Damon Linker: [11-04] Get to know the influential conservative intellectuals who help explain GOP extremism: Well, you don't really want to know them, but let's drop a few names you can try to avoid: Costin Alamariu ("Bronze Age Pervert"), Michael Anton (The Flight 93 Election; The Stakes), Patrick Deneen (Why Liberalism Failed; Regime Change), Rod Dreher (Crunchy Cons; Live Not by Lies), John Eastman (indicted Trump lawyer), Stephen Wolfe (The Case for Christian Nationalism), Curtis Yarvin ("Dark Enlightenment"). Also mentioned in passing: Tyler Cowen, Richard Hanania, Sean Hannity, Thomas Klingenstein (Claremont funder), Matthew Peterson, Christopher Rufo, Tucker Carlson.

Patrick Ruffini: [11-04] The emerging working-class Republican majority: "The coalition that elected Donald Trump in 2016 was no one-off." No point filing this in the top section on Republicans because no real Republicans were involved in the spinning of this fantasy -- adapted from the author's new book, Party of the People: Inside the Multiracial Populist Coalition Remaking the GOP. Interesting that he takes Thomas Frank's What's the Matter with Kansas? as a pivot, arguing that twenty years later "the villain of the story has switched sides." But his evidence is thin, and doesn't remotely approach policy: what's changed since Kansas is that the gullible GOP base are demanding more blood in their red meat -- the diet of bigotry and fear-mongering the Party tempts them with -- but on a practical level, Republicans are still every bit as dedicated to serving oligarchy by rendering government incompetent and corrupt. It's worth noting that in his later books, Frank turned on Democratic supplicants to the rich -- especially in 2016's Listen, Liberal!, which was harsh on the Clintons (but also Obama, Cuomo, Deval Patrick, etc.) -- but many (most?) Democrats shifted their policy priorities to actually help and expand the middle class. Sure, Trump railed against the corrosive jobs effect of trade deals, but Biden came up with policies to build jobs, and to give workers the leverage to get better pay. Trump talked infrastructure, but Biden is building it. There is still much more to be done, not least because Republicans -- no matter how populist they claim to be -- are obstacles wherever they have any leverage. The Republicans' only response is to ramp up the demagoguery and bullshit.

Jeffrey St Clair: [11-03] Roaming Charges: Shrinkwrapped, how sham psychology fueled the Texas death machine.

Hadas Thier: [11-04] Sam Bankman-Fried was guilty, and not even Michael Lewis could save him. As someone who regards all of crypto as criminal conspiracy, I was a bit surprised at how quickly and definitively this trial turned, but here it is. Also:

• Kevin T Dugan: [11-03] The real SBF stood up: "An open-and-shut case finally revealed the criminal behind the legend."

• Whizy Kim: [11-03] Sam Bankman-Fried's trial pulled back the curtain on crypto.

• Declan Harty: [11-02] Crypto faces world of legal clashes even after SBF trial.

Sean Wilentz: [10-23] The revolution within the American Revolution: "Supported and largely led by slaveholders, the American Revolution was also, paradoxically, a profound antislavery event."

Gabriel Winant: [10-13] On mourning and statehood: A response to Joshua Leifer: "How to grieve, what meaning to give those tears, is cruelly a political question whether we like it or not." Leifer's original piece was Toward a humane left, and he later wrote A reply to Gabriel Winant. I'm not here to argue with Leifer (nor with Eric Levitz, whose similar position elicited much more of my thinking in recent weeks), other than to note again that morality is a luxury most enjoyed from a distance, and can easily be used as a cudgel against people who circumstance has deprived of such options. But sure, no complaints here about making the left even more humane (and not just the left, needless to say). But I do want to quote some things Winant said, because I've had similar thoughts but haven't quite found the words:

One way of understanding Israel that I think should not be controversial is to say that it is a machine for the conversion of grief into power. The Zionist dream, born initially from the flames of pogroms and the romantic nationalist aspirations so common to the nineteenth century, became real in the ashes of the Shoah, under the sign "never again." Commemoration of horrific violence done to Jews, as we all know, is central to what Israel means and the legitimacy that the state holds -- the sword and shield in the hands of the Jewish people against reoccurrence. Anyone who has spent time in synagogues anywhere in the world, much less been in Israel for Yom HaShoah or visited Yad Vashem, can recognize this tight linkage between mourning and statehood.

This, on reflection, is a hideous fact. For what it means is that it is not possible to publicly grieve an Israeli Jewish life lost to violence without tithing ideologically to the IDF -- whether you like it or not. . . . The state will do -- already is doing -- what it does with Jewish grief: transmute it into violence. For the perpetrator, the immediate psychic satisfactions of this maneuver are easy enough to understand, although the long-term costs prove somewhat more complex.

It is this context -- the already-political grief at the core of the Zionist adventure -- that makes so many on the left so reticent to perform a public shedding of tears over Hamas's victims. They are, we might darkly say, "pre-grieved": that is, an apparatus is already in place to take their deaths and give them not just any meaning, but specifically the meaning that they find in the bombs falling on Gaza. . . . Its power, in turn, is such that the most ringing dissents calling instead for peace and humane mourning for all -- like Eric Levitz's and Joshua Leifer's -- nevertheless resonate only as whimpers of sentiment. Whatever the noble and admirable content of such humane efforts, their form is already molded. They are participating, presumably without intent, in a new Red Scare being prepared not against stray callous advocates of Hamas, but against all who defend the right of Palestinians to live, and to live as equals.

Also:

The Israeli government doesn't care if you, a principled person, perform your equal grief for all victims: it will gobble up your grief for Jews and use it to make more victims of Palestinians, while your balancing grief for Palestinians will be washed away in the resulting din of violence and repression. The impulse, repeatedly called "humane" over the past week, to find peace by acknowledging equally the losses on all sides rests on a fantasy that mourning can be depoliticized. If only it were so -- but this would be the end of Zionism, after all. More tragically, the sentiment of those who want peace and justice for all and express this by chastising those in the West whom they see to be reacting with insufficient grief and excessive politics have only given amplification to the propaganda machine that is now openly calling for the blood of the innocent and the silence of doubters.

No time for me to start unpacking this, let alone building on it, but much more could be said.

Daily Log

Boilerplate for an invite query:

My name is Tom Hull. I'm conducting the 18th Annual Francis Davis Jazz Critics Poll (started by Davis at Village Voice, most recently at ArtsFuse). We typically have about 150 notable critics and broadcast journalists submit top-10 lists. I've noticed and am duly impressed by your work, which has me wondering whether you'd welcome an invitation to vote in our poll. You can reach me at thull2@cox.net. Thanks.

Critics I've sent something like this to:

• Katherine (Katchie) Cartwright: AAJ

Daily Log

Some belated notes on October 27's belated birthday dinner. Theme was Spanish, although my plans to come up with a nice platter of tapas (appetizers) fell flat. We had 11 people, which was too much for the space. More on that later.

I had thought about making the mariscada several weeks earlier, when my niece, Rachel, came to visit, but scratched it after I took ill and didn't feel up to the shopping. (I wound up making pad thai instead, which is the easiest one-pot thing I do that's still really good.) But I had the shopping list started, and it still sounded good. I figured I could do that for one fancy dish, then spread some tapas around. I don't recall ever doing Spanish for Birthday Dinner, but I've made paella a lot, and a number of other Spanish dishes. Mariscada in Green Sauce was simply the dish I'd always end up ordering in New York restaurants, like the one on 25th and 2nd Ave a short walk from out Waterside Apartment. But I never had a proper recipe for it, so always had to improvise.

One big question has always been the seafood mix: whether I could find clams, and whether I would add lobster. I also wanted to get some uniquely Spanish ingredients, especially sausage, ham, and cheeses. So I decided I'd work up a shopping list with a wider range of tapas than I'd likely be able to get done, and pick up extra things that caught my fancy. Dinner as designed:

• Clams with almond sauce: with extra seafood (mussels, shrimp, sea scallops, lobster, snow crab).
• Crisp potatoes
• Green beans with cured ham: I substituded bacon and chorizo.
• Mushrooms in garlic sauce
• Escalivada y garum: on toasted baguette
• Olive oil tortas
• Sangria
• Coconut cake, with vanilla ice cream

I would also have assorted tapas. I jotted the following down as options, and figured I'd adjust the list after shopping:

• Crema de cabrales: a blue cheese spread
• Red pepper, cheese, garlic spread
• Fresh cheese in green mojito
• Pickled cucumbers
• Smoked fish salad
• Chorizo-filled dates in bacon

Dinner was on Friday, so I'd do my main shopping on Thursday, but I made a preliminary shopping trip on Tuesday to figure out what was available, and another on Wednesday. The shopping was a big part of the work:

• Tuesday: World Market: I picked up several packages of shrink-wrapped "tapas" (charcuterie), some loose sausage (chorizo, saucisson), tins (octopus, sardines, mackerel), jars (artichoke hearts, peppers, anchovies). Seafood Shoppe: Found out they have mussels and littleneck clams. I bought a trout spread and a $45 jar of salmon caviar, with no planned use for either. Liquor store (don't recall the name, but on Greenwich Ave, near Medi's): Spanish red wine, fino sherry. Whole Foods: Found out they also have mussels and littleneck clams. Picked up some odds and ends, including smoked sable, manchego cheese, and a shelled coconut that I wound up not using (but should have). Trader Joe's: picked up smoked trout, more cheese.
• Wednesday: Thai Binh: was closed. Dillons (21/Amidon): picked up most of my vegetable/fruit list. They had small lobster tails for $6/each, so I bought five. Also got frozen shrimp, and a few odds and ends, like ice cream.
• Thursday: Dillons (Central/Rock): Rest of vegetables except mushrooms (didn't find any I wanted). Scallops, shrimp, two more lobster tails (sale was off, so $10 each). Two breads (one baguette, one ciabatta). Clam juice. I still didn't have the mushrooms, so I tried Natural Grocers: I bought two packages of sliced shiitakes, and three packets of dried: chanterelles, porcini, something else I don't remember and don't seem to be able to find. That did it, except for late that night, when I discovered I needed milk for the cake, and had to make an extra trip.

Not on my original menu, but I picked up a sweet olive oil torta at Whole Foods (after skipping whole packages, both of sweet and savory, at World Market). I didn't care for the sugar, but liked the texture, and decided to make my own Wednesday night (omitting the sugar, dusting them with crushed fennel seeds and zataar). At that point, I was ahead of schedule, and was still in good shape after shopping on Thursday. Then, well, I fucked up.

My minimal goal for Thursday night was: make escalivada y garum, bake the cake, and make some kind of fish stock (with some prep for the mariscada dish). At least that's the way I remember it, probably because that's all I got done. What I was hoping for was getting 3-5 appetizers out of the way, and maybe some extra prep, at least sorted out.

The first started with roasting the eggplant, bell pepper, and tomato, then peel and chop. The garum is a paste made in the food processor, with oil-cured black olives, anchovies, and capers. I have a cherry pitter I use on olives, but couldn't find it, so I wound up having to pick the pits out with a knife. While I was working on that, I decided to go ahead and mix the escalivada, but working from memory, I dumped it into the food processor, and it instantly became unusable soup. I had to throw the whole dish away, and scratch it from the menu.

However, when I started working on the cake (one that I've made dozens of times), I discovered that I hadn't bothered to check the ingredients on my shopping list. The unanticipated ingredients were shortening (which I had) and milk (which I didn't). I decided then that I had to go to the grocery store (we're talking 10 pm). I did, and picked up an eggplant and peppers, and roasted them again, along with another tomato. They came out fine, as did the cake, but I had lost 2-3 hours.

The fish stock worked out better. First thing I did was boil the lobster tails. Then in the same water, I boiled the crab. I chopped off the tail ends and some of the less promising crab bits, and returned them to the pot. I added the shrimp shells. I mixed up a velvet marinade, and poured half of it over the shelled shrimp, the other half over the sea scallops (each cut in 2 or 4 pieces), and refrigerated them. I added a handful of katsuobishi (bonito flakes) to the stock pot, and brought it to a simmer. Later I added a couple scallions and some parsley. I don't recall whether I added any spices. I had clam juice, but didn't use it (it was about that color). I left it in the pot overnight, then reheated it and strained it the next day.

Nothing else I could do Thursday night.

I got up around noon Friday. I boiled the potatoes, peeled and quartered them, added some olive oil. I stringed the green beans, and boiled them. I soaked the dried mushrooms. I sliced the two breads (one baguette, one ciabatta), dabbed them with olive oil and garlic, and toasted them.

I mixed up the sangria. I was worried about having a big enough pitcher, but I really could have used a second bottle of wine. I cut up the fruit, added the wine, orange juice, Grand Marnier, a bit of sugar, and put it in the refrigerator, adding the club soda just before serving. I wound up having to ration one cup each to the guests. They said it was good.

I made the cake icing. I got the syrup up to 242°F, and it whipped up nicely, but seemed a little on the thin side. I iced the cake, and sprinkled coconut on top and sides. It looked good, but the coconut started to yellow by the time it was served. (I was using frozen, left over from last year, even though I had fresh in the refrigerator.)

I velveted the shrimp and scallops in water, about one minute each, as they would finish cooking in the mariscada.

I mixed up the mariscada sauce in the food processor, using roughly 3-4 times the recipe ingredients: garlic (about 25 cloves), bread crumbs (10 baguette slices), 1/2 cup almond flour, one bunch of flat parsley plus a bit more. I heated up some olive oil, added the mix, and stock in several additions (probably 2.5 cups in all), and let it simmer for a while, until I was ready to add the seafood. By then, I had the potatoes in the oven, the mushrooms in their garlic sauce, the green beans in a skillet with bacon and chorizo.

Since I didn't get around to anything else, I just had those four dishes to finish. I added the clams and mussels to the mariscada pot, and steamed them for about five minutes. I chopped up the lobster tails, and tried to cut the crab into pieces the meat could be extracted from. Then I folded the rest of the seafood in, so it would be ready with everything else.

As guests arrived, I put a couple to work throwing together what we could for the tapas platter. Janice assembled the toasts with garum and escalivada. I opened cans of octopus and saradines, and a jar of artichoke hearts. We cut up some cheese and chorizo, and layed out some jamon iberico and sausage slices. There was a lot more left over that didn't get served, but we had quite a bit. The only problem with a dish was the potatoes, which I let dry out in the oven.

We had eleven total, which was excessive for the dining room: Janice and Tim, Max and Beth, Mike and Gretchen, Russ and Zhana, Rannfrid, Laura and me. Plate photo post on Facebook. I commented later:

Not a lot of leftovers. Laura finished the garum, even without any escalivada. The cake had already started looking strange by dinner time -- the long-frozen coconut yellowed, prompting someone to ask if I had toasted it -- and got weirder over the next two days. The icing thinned, but the cake if anything became more moist. I finished it yesterday, then had torta and charcuterie after, which balanced off the lingering sugar. Still some mariscada left, so I'll return to that today. And then there's all the stuff I bought but didn't manage to serve. Maybe we should reconvene and just graze our way through the refrigerator and pantry?

I did wind up making a leftover tapas dinner, but not until the following Friday, and just for Gretchen and Mike (more on that below). Max took some pictures, and posted them on Facebook. He noted: "Tom Hull's almost birthday this evening with a cast of extremely interesting characters. There were no Republicans present!" I added a comment to this:

Perhaps more significantly, no one got canceled for advocating a cease fire. Two guests had actually visited Israel/Gaza. One grew up in Russia (or was it Kazakhstan?). One in Japan (although she's Norwegian). One grew up in Oklahoma. One was an exchange student in Africa. One was the child of missionaries, and another was a minister. Two are Jewish. And then there's me. And Janice, who has pretty much the same life history as me, including the same church and racist high school (I dropped out; she protested, which is why their teams are no longer called the Colonels), some years in Boston and New York, then back to Wichita. She's the activist (as is Laura), whereas I'm just a critic. All this in the belly button of Red America. I'm honored to have had the chance to cook for them.

I suppose I could have qualified that the two Jews were not the two who had visited Israel/Gaza (and by Israel I'm including the West Bank; I'm less certain about the land in between).

I finally worked my way through the tapas leftover menu a week later, on a Friday. Mike and Gretchen came over, and did us the favor of being late enough I almost got everything done, with Gretchen helping with the last stragglers. I posted a plate at Facebook. Key requirement here was no new shopping, but I did add several dishes not planned for the Birthday Dinner. I might as well order the menu from the plate photo:

• Cantaloupe with jamon iberico, with a spritz of lime
• Mushroom caviar: Russian recipe, but I didn't want to repeat the Spanish one. I had one package of sliced shiitakes. Sauteed with onion, added some mayo, lemon juice, and dill.
• Cabbage salad with raisins: I make this all the time, with carrot, bell pepper, and vinaigrette.
• Potato salad with smoked salmon, olives, and capers: Russian recipe, with red onion, dill, and vinaigrette.
• Calf liver in almond sauce: I used a half pound from the freezer; the parsley's just a garnish.
• Chorizo-stuffed dates wrapped in bacon.
• Manchego with roasted red pepper.
• Mozzarella pearls in green mojito.
• Semi-pickled cucumbers, with onion and spices (they could have used more time).
• Smoked fish salad: sable, trout, a little bit of salmon, with mayo.
• Chorizo cooked in sherry.
• Gorgonzola with apple, raisins, walnuts and pine nuts: Recipe called for cabrales.

The only actual leftover (not pictured) was the surprisingly still fresh olive oil tortas, which worked instead of bread. The cheese and fish spreads, dates, and pickles were in the original menu, plus I picked up the cantaloupe for possibly this use. I had leftover potatoes and mushrooms, but didn't want to do the same recipes. While there are lots of Spanish potato salad tapas, I had extra smoked salmon, olives, and dill, so this was an easy choice. Same for the mushrooms, and I liked this presentation. The liver is a personal favorite, but I didn't consider it for the main dinner because I was already doing another almond sauce. However, here it worked as a main meat dish, although the portions were tiny (1/2 pound for four people).

The cake was gone, and I didn't want to bake anything new, or make flan. But we had a quart of Ben & Jerry's Vanilla left, so I proposed sundaes. I toasted pecans and filberts, chopped them, and whipped some cream. I had a little bit of Hershey's dark chocolate sauce, so I divided it up, and added a caramel sauce option. When I ran out of ice cream, I added a scoop of Edy's. (Mine was all Edy's, with just caramel.) Pretty decent dessert for no cooking.

Still have some cheese and sausage left over, as well as tins of fish, and olives -- I could have done a whole olive thing. But all things considered, the two meals pretty much balanced off the shopping.

Looking through my Notebook, I've found several references to past Spanish dinners:

• 2001-05-22: Kathy's birthday. Made: clams in almond sauce (plus shrimp, sea scallops, lobster); red bean stew; oven roasted potatoes; orange salad with onion, almonds, and raisins; orange yogurt cake.

• 2004-07-18: For 13, including Jan and Lou Jean: mariscada in almond sauce; salt cod with potatoes, tomatoes and peppers; red bean stew; marinated quail; escalivada and garum with garlic bread; asparagus wrapped in prosciuto with fontina; sauteed frog legs; gorgonzola/chevre cheese dip; marinated quail eggs; cracked green olives; pickled eggplant; eretz israel cake (marzipan, candied oranges, dates); coconut cake (for Jan).

• 2007-10-25: Birthday dinner: clams in almond sauce (plus shrimp, scallops, lobster); saffron rice with pine nuts; asparagus in almond sauce (red, not green); mushrooms in sherry sauce; escalivada and garum on garlic toasts; garlic shrimp; piquillo pepper salad with raisins and pine nuts; cheese pate with walnuts and peppers (chevre, gorgonzola); sliced Spanish chorizo and manchego cheese; orange yogurt cake.

• 2009-06-22: "Fixed dinner for six Friday night to celebrate the unveiling of the new kitchen": mariscada in almond sauce; asparagus in more almond sauce; roasted potato slices; sauteed mushrooms with prosciutto; salt cod salad; sweet yogurt cream on mixed berries on almond cupcakes.

• 2012-03-19: Passing mention of "cooking a very nice Spanish dinner (mariscada in almond sauce)."

• 2012-03-24: Back from Independence, where Jan and Lou Jean were visiting, after cooking paella valenciana there. (Also a coconut cake for Jan.)

• 2017-12-26: Made paella valenciana (with lobster, shrimp, and scallops, but no clams). Also "some tapas": potatoes with tuna and egg; white bean salad; pisto (onions, zucchini, peppers, tomatoes); sauteed mushrooms in garlic sauce; olives; garlic bread; date pudding.

• 2019-11-18: "a fairly simple dinner on Tuesday -- a big pot of paella plus something for dessert [unspecified]."

• 2020-12-28: Pandemic lockdown Christmas takeout dinner (some but mostly not Spanish): paella, with kielbasa, shrimp, and scallops (but no chicken or clams); garlic chicken wings; Tuscan spare ribs; Tunisian fish (cod, with preserved lemons and olives); green bean ragout (with potatoes); cauliflower gratin; herb pie (onion, kale, chard, arugula, herbs, cheeses, wrapped in filo and baked); hotiatiki salad; mast va khiar (cucumber, yogurt, scallions, sultanas, black walnuts, mint). Plus many desserts: date pudding; tiramisu; oatmeal stout cake; chocolate sheet cake; macadamia nut-white chocolate cookeis; Moroccan mixed fruit.

• 2021-05-10: First time since pandemic started we had a guest for dinner. paella valenciana (with chicken wings, kielbasa, Chinese sausage, shrimp, lobster tail); white beans; mushrooms in garlic sauce; cabbage and green bell pepper slaw; tuna-egg-tomato salad; roasted pepper salad; deviled eggs stuffed with salmon; strawberry shortcake, and key lime pie (whipped cream on both).

I recall making a duck paella early after we got to Wichita, but it doesn't appear in the notebook. I've done several of the dishes listed above on their own (especially the salt cod and the red bean stew). I've also made roasted chicken with samfaina, which is a glorious dish. I also recall a calf liver in almond sauce that was very good.

Music Week

Expanded blog post, October archive (final).

Tweet: Music Week: 31 albums, 7 A-list

Music: Current count 41078 [41047] rated (+31), 32 [31] unrated (+1).

I spent most of last week thinking about, shopping for, and finally cooking up this year's birthday dinner. I've made it to 73, which is +3 from my grandfather, and -4 from my father, so it's starting to weigh heavy on my mind. Dinner was served on Friday, as several guests had schedule conflicts for Wednesday. Menu was Spanish:

• Mariscada in almond sauce (aka "green sauce").
• Crisp potatoes.
• Green beans with chorizo.
• Mushrooms in garlic sauce.
• Escalivada y garum on toasts.
• Olive oil tortas with cheese and Spanish ham and sausages.

I also opened up a couple cans and jars: octopus, sardines, artichoke hearts. I had bought much more for possible tapas, but ran out of time to get them prepared, or in some cases simply organized. I mixed up a batch of sangria to drink, and had my traditional coconut cake for dessert, with vanilla ice cream. (I know, reminds you of the "white cake" in Tarrantino's Django Unchained. Sometimes we can't help being who we are.)

I meant to write up notes, and will after this post. They should show up in a future notebook entry (which I've already stubbed out, so the link will work, and eventually get you the information). Facebook entry, including a plate pic, is here. A "memory" entry, with a recycled picture of last year's cake, is here. The actual cake was even uglier, and not just because it was less blindingly white. No complaints, except for the guy who was so phobic about seafood he didn't eat anything until the cake was served.

Saturday, I woke up with my vision for how the so-called Israel-Hamas War ends, so I quickly wrote it up as the "First Introduction" to my Speaking of Which. I'm reluctant to call it a proposal, because it is not remotely close to people genuinely concerned with justice for all wanted or hoped for. (I know, for sure, that my wife hates it, and nearly all of my research into the conflict owes to her passionate interest.) And I suppose my plea for someone else to pick up these ideas and run with them is partly due to my reluctance to sign my name to it.

I have, ever since my late teens, devoted myself to conjuring up utopian solutions to practical problems. Because, well, I've never pretended to be an activist. I'm just a thinker, so why constrain myself to things that other people consider possible? But I've also developed a good deal of pessimism, and that creeps in whenever I consider what's possible, as engineers must.

Instantly, when I heard the news of Oct. 7, I understood that Israel's leaders would want to destroy everything and to kill everyone in Gaza, leaving at most an escape hatch through Egypt. I knew that America's leaders would back them to the hilt, as they've long given up any capacity for independent thought, and they're every bit as committed to force as the Israelis. And I expected Israelis to take advantage of this to step up their attacks on Palestinians in the West Bank and elsewhere. And all of that has happened, just as expected. Hence, my first reaction was to warn that this would be nothing less than genocide.

That, too, has been born out, though the point of using the word was to make people conscious of the full danger (and I was far from the only one to raise this alarm). I also intuited how things would play out over time. I can't really explain this, but through all my reading, and a fair number of conversations, I've developed this really complex psychological model of most of the people involved. I intuited that a great many Palestinians would stick in Gaza, even daring Israel to kill them. I doubted that Egypt would have welcomed them anyway, or could have dealt with them (as Israel imagined they could).

I also suspected that a great many Israelis, even ones who have clearly demonstrated their racism and militarism, would grow weary of the killing, and embarrassed by their own inhumanity. (One book I kept thinking back to was Richard Rhodes' Masters of Death, where he explained that the Nazis, who are our archetypal example of cold-blooded killers, designed their death camp processes out of concern that killing Jews in the field was traumatizing German soldiers. While Nazis made no secret of their hatred for Jews, the enormity of the Holocaust was only possible through stealth, under cover of war.) As the killing continued, as the rubble grew, some sense of need to limit the war would grow, and Israel's leaders, even as blinded as they are, will eventually need some escape from their own handiwork.

What's become more and more clear is that Israel can't hide their slaughter in Gaza. The world can, and will, see it, and will not react kindly to the people responsible. And sure, Hamas will get some share of the blame -- they were uniquely responsible for one day, out of more than three weeks now -- but the fact that the slaughter continues, that it has turned into genocide, is solely the dictate of Netanyahu and his mob, not that you should spare those who have aided, abetted, propagandized, and even championed the massacre (which from where I stand mostly look like Americans).

My "vision" is just a way to clean up a particularly sore part of a larger, deeper, and still potentially deadly mess. There are lots of things that should happen afterwards. But what makes it practical now is that the people who are immediately responsible don't have to change character. All they have to do is back off, and let others tend to the wounds. Is that really too much to ask?

Apologies to those of you who just want the latest music dope, but you must know how to scroll past my rants by now. I had damn near nothing, other than the Clifford Ocheltree picks down in the Old Music section, before I started writing Speaking of Which on Saturday. But I worked through a steady stream of records once I started writing, so with the extra day came up with a semi-normal week. Among the high B+, National and Angelica Sanchez tempted me to replays, but they didn't quite manage to move the needle.

This coming week, I will put up a website for the 18th Annual Francis Davis Critics Poll, and I will start communicating with a few possible voters, trying to gauge interest and identify others who should vote with us. The voters from last year are listed here. They will all be invited back, but please let me know if there are any others you read and find useful. I'd like to see more international critics, although those are particularly hard for me to judge. I'm also tempted to slip in a few more jazz-knowledgeable rock critics -- where I figure the minimal qualification is listen to 200+ jazz albums per year (used to be expensive, but easy enough with streaming) and write about at least 5-10 (or more if you, like me, write real short). I'd welcome suggestions from publicists and musicians, but probably not for yourself or each other. (Not an absolute rule, as we've had the odd exception from time to time.)

I'm also toying with the idea of forming an advisory board, if you really want to get deep into the weeds. There's a fair chance I won't be doing this beyond this year, so this might be a chance to eventually step up.

End of October, so I still need to do the indexing on the archive file. It's also time to reorganize my 2023 list into separate jazz and non-jazz lists. I've already started expanding my tracking file so I'll be ready to look up jazz albums when ballots start to flow in. And I will probably set up my usual EOY aggregate files, as they build on the tracking file, and have long been one of my favorite wastes of time.

New records reviewed this week:

• Affinity Trio [Eric Jacobson/Pamela York/Clay Schaub]: Hindsight (2022 [2023], Origin): [cd]: B+(***)
• Constantine Alexander: Firetet (2023, self-released): [cd]: B+(**)
• Bark: Loud (2023, Dial Back Sound): [bc]: B+(**)
• Corook: Serious Person (Part 2) (2023, Atlantic, EP): [sp]: A-
• Paul Dunmall/Olie Brice: The Laughing Stone (2021 [2023], Confront): [bc]: B+(***)
• The Front Bottoms: You Are Who You Hang Out With (2023, Fueled by Ramen): [sp]: B+(*)
• Grrrl Gang: Spunky! (2023, Big Romantic): [sp]: B+(*)
• Darius Jones: Fluxkit Vancouver (Its Suite but Sacred) (2022 [2023], We Jazz): [sp]: A-
• Sunny Kim/Vardan Ovsepian/Ben Monder: Liminal Silence (2023, Earshift Music): [cd]: C+ [11-10]
• Frank Kohl: Pacific (2022 [2023], OA2): [cd]: B+(***)
• Sofia Kourtesis: Madres (2023, Ninja Tune): [sp]: B+(**)
• Chien Chien Lu: Built in System: Live in New York (2023, Giant Step Arts): [sp]: B+(***)
• Vic Mensa: Victor (2023, Roc Nation): [sp]: B+(*)
• The National: Laugh Track (2023, 4AD): [sp]: B+(***)
• No-No Boy: Empire Electric (2023, Smithsonian Folkways): [sp]: B+(***)
• Alogte Oho & His Sounds of Joy: O Yinne! (2023, Philophon): [sp]: B+(***)
• Graham Parker & the Goldtops: Last Chance to Learn the Twist (2023, Big Stir): [sp]: B+(**)
• Ratboys: The Window (2023, Topshelf): [sp]: B+(***)
• Mike Reed: The Separatist Party (2023, We Jazz/Astral Spirits): [sp]: A-
• The Rolling Stones: Hackney Diamonds (2023, Polydor): [sp]: B
• The Angelica Sanchez Nonet: Nighttime Creatures (2023, Pyroclastic): [cd]: B+(***)
• Joe Santa Maria: Echo Deep (2023, Orenda): [cd]: B- [11-03]
• Slow Pulp: Yard (2023, Anti-): [sp]: B+(**)
• Steep Canyon Rangers: Morning Shift (2023, Yep Roc): [sp]: B+(*)
• Dan Tyminski: God Fearing Heathen (2023, 8 Track Entertainment): [sp]: A-
• Pabllo Vittar: Noitada (2023, Sony Music): [sp]: B+(**)
• Pabllo Vittar: After (2023, Sony Music): [sp]: B+(*)

Recent reissues, compilations, and vault discoveries:

• None.

Old music:

• Big Bill Broonzy: Big Bill's Blues (1937-41 [1968], CBS): [sp]: A-
• Big Bill Broonzy/Washboard Sam: Big Bill Broonzy With Washboard Sam (1953 [1962], Chess): [sp]: A-
• The Golden Era of Rock & Roll 1954-1963 (1954-63 [2004], Hip-O, 3CD): [cd]: A
• Alogte Oho & His Sounds of Joy: Mam Yinne Wa (2019, Philophon): [sp]: B+(***)

Unpacking: Found in the mail last week:

• Susan Alcorn/Septeto Del Sur: Canto (Relative Pitch) [11-10]
• Ballister: Smash and Grab (Aerophonic) [01-16]
• John Bishop: Antwerp (Origin) [11-17]
• Gabriel Guerrero & Quantum: Equilibrio (Origin) [11-17]
• Chien Chien Lu: Built in System: Live in New York (Giant Step Arts) [10-06]
• Sarah McKenzie: Without You (Normandy Lane Music) [10-27]
• Alon Nechushtan: For Those Who Cross the Seas (ESP-Disk, 2CD) [10-27]
• Robert Prester & Adriana Samargia: Quenara (Commonwealth Ave. Productions) [01-19]

Daily Log

Started to write up some belated notes on October 27's belated birthday dinner, but needing to get my Music Week post out first, I've punted them to November 1.

Elias Vlanton posted this on Facebook, and Jane Silver added: "Let me say it out loud: these are war crimes!" I commented further:

I've become increasingly skeptical of the notion that there is sufficient international order to define anything as criminal, but sure, war is the worst of all possible crimes, and the devastation of a relatively defenseless land and people by a modern military powerhouse is, well, the only word in our vocabulary that comes close is genocide. Needless to say, I've written a fair amount in recent weeks, including yesterday's post: Link.

Speaking of Which

Blog link.

Postscript Introduction

Note: It got too late Sunday night before I completed my rounds, much less checked spelling and formatting and did the other bits of housekeeping I need to do before posting, so let this sit overnight. I changed the date to Monday, but didn't make another round. I did add the bits from Twitter, and one more link on the UAW strike, since that not only really matters but wraps up the trifecta. Music Week will be delayed until Tuesday. The extra day has so far been good for two more A- records (surprises at that).

By the way, if anyone wants to try reformulating the introduction plan into an op-ed or a more serious proposal, please go ahead and do so (no citation required, but if you want to talk about it, feel free to reach out). I have no standing in mainstream media (or for that matter in solidly left-wing and/or antiwar media), and I have no appetite for throwing myself at their feet.

And yes, I understand why the plan as sketched out will be hard for lots of well-meaning folks to swallow. I'm sorry that in politics people hardly ever pay for their crimes. I was 18 when Richard Nixon was elected president, and no one in my lifetime ever deserved to pay more. (Well, maybe Winston Churchill, but he died when I was 14, or Joseph Stalin, who died when I was 2.) But that almost never happens, and even when some measure of justice is meted out, it's never enough. Nixon was granted a pardon, and retired not even to obscurity, but at least out of harm's way.

The proposed scheme simply splits off one part of the conflict and arranges it so the sides stop hurting each other. It's urgent to do so because it's turned into a self-destruction pact, as sore to Israel as it is fatal to Gaza. It leaves the rest of the conflict in place, in hopes that Israel will, in good time, recognize that they cannot forever deny Palestinians their dignity. I'm not very optimistic that they will come to their senses, but the odds are better than now, in the fevered heat of war.

The key points here are these: you cannot force Israel to do anything they're unwilling to do; you have to give Israel an option that they can choose that doesn't require that they change their fundamental political beliefs; you cannot appeal to the conscience of Israel's leaders, because they don't have a functioning one; you don't have to solve any problem but the immediate one in Gaza; you don't have to deal with Palestine's leaders, because none of them are legitimate; you do have to provide a path where the people of Gaza can live normal lives, in peace and dignity, where they have no practical need to lash out at Israel or anyone else. It is in the interest of the whole world to end this conflict, so it is worthwhile to put some effort into making it work. But for now the only piece you have to solve is Gaza, because that's the one that's spun out of control.

First Introduction

From early grade school, my favorite subject was "social studies," with geography and history key dimensions. But I also had aptitude for science, at least until an especially boorish teacher turned me off completely. I dropped out of high school, but not finding myself with any other competency, I tested my way into college, where my main studies were in sociology and philosophy. I turned my back on academic studies, but never stopped adding to my store of knowledge -- if anything, I redoubled my efforts after 2000.

Politics turned out to be mostly rhetoric: people were measure by how good they sounded, not by anything they actually did. Sure, social scientists measured things, but mostly their own prejudiced assumptions. But engineers didn't waste their time railing about the injustices of gravity and entropy. Engineers fixed things. And better than that, engineers designed and built things to not break -- or, at least, to serve a useful life before they wore out.

So, when I encounter a political problem, I tend to think about it as an engineer would (or should), in terms of function and the forces working against it. I can't be value-neutral in this, nor can anyone, though I'm better at most at recognizing my own prejudices, and at suspending judgment on those of others. A big part of my kit is what Robert Wright calls "cognitive empathy": the ability to imagine someone else's view. This is a skill that is sorely needed, and way too often lacking, in diplomats. (You're most likely to find it in sales, where one is measured on deals made, rather than on political rhetoric that precludes agreement.)

So when I encounter a political problem, my instinct is to come up with a solution: an approach that will reduce the conflict in a way that will lead to prolonged stability. It's always tempting to come up with a universal solution based on first principles, but history offers few examples of conflicted sides finding such common ground. That means for most acute conflicts we have to come up with short-range, partial fixes.

Over the last twenty years, I've come up with a lot of partial and a few comprehensive solutions to the Israel/Palestine conflict. They've never been taken seriously, by either side, or even by potentially influential third parties. The basic reason is that politically powerful Israelis are unwilling to grant concessions to Palestinians, even a small territory they have no settlement interest in (Gaza), basic human rights, and/or any real measure of economic freedom. There are various reasons and/or excuses for this, but the most important one is that no outside nation nor any possible internal force (nonviolent or not) has anything close to enough power to persuade Israel to change course. So the first rule is you have to give Israel something they would prefer to the course they have charted, which is to lay waste to Gaza, making it uninhabitable to the people who manage to survive their assault.

The first lesson Israeli leaders should draw from their war is that while it's easy to kill enough Palestinians to make you look monstrous, it's really hard to kill enough to make any real demographic difference. As long as Palestinians survive and hang onto what's left of their land, they remain to challenge and defy Israeli colonialism, sacrificing their bodies and appealing to international conscience. And while people of good will, many sympathetic to the Palestinian plight, were quick to condemn the violent outbreak, its main effect was to shock Israel into showing their true colors: that domination is based on overwhelming power, and the willingness to use it savagely when provoked.

Hence, Israel's response to the uprising -- the deadliest single day in Israel's history -- was first to threaten the total demolition of Gaza and the deaths of everyone who lived there (offering a mass exodus through Egypt as the only path to safety), then a systematic military campaign, starting with massive bombardment and leading to a ground invasion. With over two million people in Gaza, that could amount to the largest genocide since WWII. Israel's one-sided war on Gaza has slogged on for three weeks, with some of the heaviest bombing in recent history, destroying infrastructure, driving more than a million people from their homes, and theatening starvation. The longer this continues, the more world opinion will shift against Israel's brutality, until what little good will remains dissipates in disgust.

At some point, Israeli leaders are bound to realize three things: that continuing the killing hurts them more than it helps; that large numbers of Palestinians will stay in Gaza no matter what; and that as long as there are Palestinians in Gaza, the land is of no practical use to Israel. The only viable solution to this is for Israel to cut Gaza loose. The simplest way to do this is to return the mandate to the UN. This doesn't require any negotiations with Palestinians, so it doesn't resolve any issues with Palestinians within Israel, the occupied territories, or refugees elsewhere. Israel simply sets its conditions for the transfer. If the UN accepts, Israel withdraws its troops, and ceases all engagement with Gaza. Given the humanitarian catastrophe unfolding, the UN will have little choice, but everyone would be best served with some minimal understandings. I think the following would be reasonable:

1. Israel removes any ground forces it has in Gaza, and seals the border. Israel unilaterally ceases fire, except in retaliation for attacks (e.g., rockets) from Gaza. Israel reserves the right to retaliate for each attack, one munition (shell, bomb, rocket, etc., but probably larger) for each munition used against Israel, but only within 24 hours of the incident.

2. Israel is responsible for its land border with Gaza. Israel retains the right to continue patrolling the airspace and sea front until other arrangements are negotiated with the UN and/or future Gaza government. If Israel abuses these rights, there should be some court or referee to nonviolently resolve these disputes (but it's pretty unlikely Israel will agree to that).

3. The UN will organize a provisional, representative government in Gaza, and will eventually organize elections (e.g., within one year of handover). The UN may dictate a constitution and a basic legal framework, which may be democratically amended or rewritten after a fixed period of time (e.g., 5 years). The UN will organize donors to provide aid in reconstruction, and may attach conditions to its aid (e.g., a court to police against corruption). The UN will issue passports to residents/citizens of Gaza, allowing them to leave if they wish, and to return at any future point they may desire.

4. Israel and Gaza will be granted amnesty against possible charges under international law up to the date of ceasefire and transfer, and not limited to interactions between Israel and Gaza. All individuals within Gaza will also receive amnesty for their role in the revolt or other incidents that occurred up to the date of transfer. All political organizations in Gaza will be banned, and their property will be expropriated. New organizations may be formed from scratch, but none may reused the names of banned parties. Past membership in a banned political party will not be penalized.

5. UNHCR-registered refugees in Gaza will enjoy full rights as citizens of Gaza, and will no longer be considered refugees from Israel. This doesn't affect the rights of refugees resident elsewhere. As a condition of its independence, Gaza may not call itself Palestine, and may not make any claims to land and/or people not presently contained in Gaza.

Other items not specified are subject to negotiation, which I imagine will be easier once the break is made, peace is established, and some degree of normalcy returns. Two things I haven't stressed are the desire to disarm Gaza, and the question of inspecting imports to keep weapons from entering Gaza. These things should be implemented voluntarily by Gaza itself. More weapons invites retaliation, which is inevitably collective punishment. As long as Israel retains that right, weapons shouldn't matter to them.

Another thing I didn't bother with is the hostage situation. I assume that the hostages will be released, even without negotiation, before amnesty kicks in. Of course, if Hamas is as bloodthirsty as Israel wants you to believe, they could also be executed before amnesty, in which case maybe some negotiation and exchange should take place first. I didn't want to make it more complicated than it had to be. As for the hostages Israel has taken prisoner, that call is up to Israel. Some sort of mass release, especially of prisoners who could be repatriated to Gaza, would be a welcome gesture, but need not be immediate: I hardly think Gaza really needs an influx of radicalized militants, which is the main produce of Israeli jails.

Israel gets several major wins here: they gain viable long-term security from threats emanating from Gaza; they give up responsibility for the welfare of Gaza, which they've shown no serious interest in or aptitude for; they get an internationally-recognized clean slate, immediately after committing an especially egregious crime against humanity (they're still liable for future acts against Palestinians, but they get a chance to reset that relationship); they break the link between Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank, and they tilt the demographic balance in the area Israel controls back to a strong Jewish majority; they get a partial solution to the refugee; and they will have already shown the world how hard they strike back, without having to go complete "final solution."

But the biggest concession to Israel is that they get to control the timing, simply because no one can let alone will move to stop them. They can bomb until they run out, which isn't very likely given that the US is already resupplying them. They can kill, maim, destroy, until they run out of targets or simply wear themselves out. Or until they develop a conscience and/or a sense of shame over how world opinion and history will view them. Or until their friends take pity and urge restraint. Or until they start losing more soldiers than they're willing to risk -- the least likely of all, given that nobody is rushing to resupply Gaza with the arms they desperately need to defend themselves (as the US and Europe did for Ukraine).

The point -- probably but not certainly short of extermination -- is that eventually Israel will tire of the killing, but still need to dispose of the rubble and the corpses. That's when this framework comes into play. Sooner would be better for everyone, but later is the dominant mindset in Israel today, and one that is unfortunately reinforced by America.

What Israel gives up is an endless series of wars and other depredations which make them look like arrogant warmongers, and make them seem malign to most of the people in most of the countries in the world. (Even in the US, even with virtually every politician of both parties in their pockets, their reputation is currently in free fall.)

Few Palestinian politicians will welcome this proposal, especially as it isn't even up to them. It's hard to argue that they've served their people well over the years, even if one recognizes that they've been dealt an especially weak hand in face of Israeli ruthlessness. But for the people of Gaza, this offers survival, freedom, and a measure of dignity. And for the world, and especially for the UN, this offers a chance to actually fix something that got broke on the UN's watch 75 years ago and has been an open sore ever since.

But sure, this leaves many more problems to be worked on. There are border issues with Lebanon and Syria. There is apartheid, loss of rights, harassment, even pogroms within Israel -- all of which offer reasons to continue BDS campaigns. At some point, Israel could decide to cut off more land to reduce its Palestinian population, but they could also reduce tensions by moving toward equal rights, secure in the expectation of a strong Jewish majority. That might spell the end of the extreme right-wing parties, at least the leverage they've recently held over Netanyahu, and for that matter the end of Netanyahu, who's done nothing but drive Israel over the brink.

Meanwhile, all we can really do is to campaign for an immediate ceasefire, both to arrest the genocidal destruction of Gaza and to salvage Israelis from the ultimate shame of their political revenge. The time for both-sidesing this is past. There is little point in even mentioning Hamas any more. This isn't a war. This is a cold, calculate massacre. History will not be kind to the people who laid the foundations of this conflict, and will judge even more harshly those who are carrying it to its ultimate ends.

I'll end this intro with something I wrote back on October 9, a mere two days into this "war" (which I initially described as a "prison break and crime spree," before moving on to a comparison to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising of 1944 -- it's not exactly ironic how often Palestinian suffering echoes calamities in Jewish history):

Anyone who condemns Hamas for the violence without also condemning Israel for its violence, and indeed for the violence and injustice it has inflicted on Palestinians for many decades now, is not only an enemy of peace and social justice, but under the circumstances is promoting genocide.

Bold in the original, and still valid here. And three weeks later, you know who you are.

Top story threads:

Israel: See introduction above. Just scattered links below, one that caught my interest and/or pissed me off. For more newsy stuff, see the "live updates" from Vox; Guardian; Washington Post. There are also "daily reports" at Mondoweiss.

• Ellen Ioanes/Jonathan Guyer/Zack Beauchamp: [10-28] Israeli troops are in Gaza: 7 big questions about the war, answered. This is a fairly generic intro. I don't put much stock into arguments that the reason Hamas attacked when they did had much to do with topical or even strategic concerns like the Saudi Arabia alliance or the latest Al-Aqsa Mosque outrages. Rather, as Israel keeps lurching to the right, and as America becomes more servile to the Israeli right, the sense of desperation has increased. In such times, violence at least seems like the one free thing one can do, a way to spread the pain and get the world's attention. I've often pointed out that the attraction of rockets is that the walls can't stop them. They're the one way people in Gaza have of making their presence felt to their tormentors, of reminding the world of their suffering. Of course, every time they do that, Israel strikes back, massively, reminding the world that their hold over Gaza is based on murderous force -- that that's the kind of people Palestinians are struggling to free themselves from. It doesn't work, in America at least, because we're so conditioned to love Israel and hate its enemies.

• Rania Abouzeid: [10-21] The simmering Lebanese front in Israel's war.

• Paula Aceves: [10-27] The corporate and cultural fallout from the Israel-Hamas war. I don't have time to sift through this long list just to feel outraged, but will remind you that the first casualties of every war are anyone who doubts the necessity of the war and the virtues of the warriors (the ones who presume to represent you; the others, of course, are evil inhuman ogres, and anyone who can't see that is a naïve simp or far worse). I'll also note that one of the fired was pursed for sharing a link to an Onion title, "Dying Gazans Criticized For Not Using Last Words To Condemn Hamas." I missed that piece, but did take note of two other Onion headlines: U.S. warns a Gaza ceasefire would only benefit humanity; and Biden Expresses Doubts That Enough Palestinians Have Died.

• Michael Arria: [10-28] We are witnessing the largest U.S. anti-war protests in 20 years. Not just the US: See Philip Weiss: [10-29] The world is seeing, and rising.

• Ronen Bergman/Mark Mazzetti/Maria Abi-Habib: [10-29] How years of Israeli failures on Hamas led to a devastating attack: "Israeli officials completely underestimated the magnitude of the Oct. 7 attacks by Hamas, shattering the country's once invincible sense of security."

• Paola Caridi: [10-26] Does the US really know the Arab world at all? You would think that for all those years of risking American lives, they would have developed some expertise, but both the political and military career paths mostly favored the advancement of facilitators of established prejudice, and certainly not critics, or even people with cognitive empathy. Author has a recent book: Hamas: From Resistance to Regime. I have zero confidence that anyone else I've read in recent months has any real insight into Hamas.

• Isaac Chotiner: [10-25] Is this the end of the Netanyahu era? Interview with Netanyahu biographer Anshel Pfeffer, a columnist at Haaretz.

• Jessica Corbet: [10-29] 30 Israeli groups urge global community to help stop surging West Bank settler violence: "Unfortunately, the Israeli government is supportive of these attacks and does nothing to stop the violence."

• Connor Echols:

  • [10-24] Whistleblower Josh Paul: 'Political pressure' helps Israel skirt US arms rules: Interview with Paul, who recently wrote the op-ed: [10-23] This is not the State Department I know. That's why I left my job.

  • [10-25] Tracking the US military build-up today in the Middle East.

• Richard Falk: [10-24] The West's refusal to call for a ceasefire is a green light to Israel's ethnic cleansing.

• Thomas Friedman: [10-29] The Israeli officials I speak with tell me they know two things for sure. Friedman's such a reliable mouthpiece for those "Israeli officials" that he's rarely worth reading, but his counsel today, that sometimes it's better to do nothing when provoked, is sound, and compared to the hysteria of most of his cohort, refreshing. An earlier version of this op-ed took the last line as a title: "Please, Israel, don't get lost in those tunnels." That sums up his concern: he couldn't care less what happens to Palestinians, but he realizes that what Netanyahu's gang is doing is ultimately very bad for the Israeli people he so treasures.

• Neta Golan: [10-28] Israeli attacks on Gaza's healthcare sector are a form of genocide.

• Melvin Goodman: Israeli state terrorism over the years.

• Ryan Grim: The lights are off. Here's what we know about life and death inside Gaza: Interview with Maram Al-Dada. Also: Inside a Gaza village: "All of us will die, but we don't know when".

• Jonathan Guyer: [10-27] The Biden administration needs to update its old thinking on Israel-Palestine: "A viral essay by Biden's foreign policy adviser shows why Israel is more of a liability to the US than anyone's ready to admit." The official is national security adviser Jake Sullivan, and the piece is classic self-delusion, something shockingly common among Washington think-tankers, with their blind faith in throwing their power around, with little care for whoever gets hurt in the process. Guyer contrasts Sullivan's piece(s) with a recent one by Obama advisor:

• Ben Rhodes: [10-18] Gaza: The cost of escalation. Behind a paywall, so let's at least quote a bit:

  The immediate comparisons to the September 11 attacks felt apt to me not only because of the shock of violence on such a scale but also because of the emotional response that followed. . . .

  But imagine if you were told on September 12, 2001, about the unintended consequences of our fearful and vengeful reaction. That we would launch an illogical war in Iraq that would kill hundreds of thousands of people, fuel sectarian hatred in the Middle East, empower Iran, and discredit American leadership and democracy itself. That we would find ourselves facing an ever-shifting threat from new iterations of al-Qaeda and from groups, like ISIS, that on September 11 did not yet exist. That we would squander our moment of global predominance fighting a war on terror rather than focusing on the climate's tipping point, a revanchist Russia under Vladimir Putin, or the destabilizing effects of rampant inequality and unregulated technologies. That our commitment to global norms and international law would be cast aside in ways that would be expropriated by all manner of autocrats who claimed that they, too, were fighting terror. That a war in Afghanistan, which seemed so justified at the outset, would end in the chaotic evacuation of desperate Afghans, including women and girls who believed the story we told them about securing their future.

  This accounting does not begin to encompass the effects of America's renewed militarized nationalism, jingoism, and xenophobia on our own society after September 11, which ultimately turned inward. While it is far from the only factor, the US response to September 11 bears a large share of the blame for the dismal and divisive state of our politics, and the collapse of Americans' confidence in our own institutions and one another. If someone painted that picture for you on September 12, wouldn't you have thought twice about what we were about to do?

  I can't look up exactly what I was thinking on 9/11/2001 because I was in Brooklyn, away from the computer where I had started keeping my pre-blog online notebook, but my memory is pretty clear. I knew in an instant that the crashed planes were blowback from past imperial misadventures, that the political caste in Washington would take them not as tragic crimes but as an insult to American hyperpowerdom, that their arrogance would strike back arrogantly, that the consequences would be impossible to predict, but would certainly create more enemies than they could possibly vanquish. I probably could have figured out that the war madness would poison our domestic politics, much as the Cold War played such a large role in crippling our labor unions. Even before 9/11, Netanyahu and Barak and Sharon had conspired to wreck the Oslo Accords and trigger an Intifada they would use to permanently disable the Palestinian Authority, figuring they'd rather fight with Hamas than negotiate with Arafat.

• Benjamin Hart: [10-26] Why Ehud Barak thinks Israel must invade Gaza: He's a big part of the problem in Israel over the last 30 years, even as he's tried to position himself as the smarter/tougher alternative to Netanyahu. I mean, he is, but not much, especially not much of an alternative, but he is much clearer and much less of a liar, so you can learn things listening to him.

• David Hearst: [10-23] Israel-Palestine war: Starmer's Gaza betrayal shows he is failing as a leader: UK Labour Party leader Keir Starmer, who saved the party for neoliberalism by ousting actual leftist Jeremy Corbyn, and who is likely to become Prime Minister next time voters get a chance to choose one. "This is the first time Britain has been complicit in a direct Israeli military action since the Suez Crisis in 1956."

• Ellen Ioanes: [10-24] Israelis feel abandoned by Netanyahu after October 7.

• Jake Johnson: [10-26] Eight progressives vote against House Israel Resolution that ignores Palestinian suffering. This was the first act of the House after electing Mike Johnson speaker. The vote was 412-10, with one Republican and one non-CPC Democrat dissenting, six Democrats registering as "present." The Senate passed a similar resolution unanimously -- despite More than 300 former Sanders staffers urge him to lead cease-fire resolution in Senate.

• Jimmy Johnson: [10-28] Genocide has been catching up to Israelis ever since Zionism's inception. "Israelis now perpetrate small-scale pogroms like the one Issacharoff reported on such a regular basis that they are barely considered newsworthy."

• Fred Kaplan: [10-24] How George W. Bush helped Hamas come to power. The history is basically accurate, but I have a different take on it. Israel never wanted a "partner for peace," so they never wanted a Palestinian leadership that enjoyed strong popular support. In Arafat, and later in Abbas, they thought they had a pawn they could manipulate, but they never wanted either to be popular, so they never really offered them much, ultimately sabotaging their authority and sending the Palestinians searching for an alternative who would stand up for them. That could have been Hamas, but Israel sabotaged them too -- with America's support, as it was easy to convince Bush that Hamas were hopeless terrorists. So the title rings true, but what really happened was that in denying Fatah any chance to serve Palestinians, they created a vacuum that Hamas tried to fill, then kept them from any effective power, driving them back to terrorism.

• Isabel Kershner: [10-29] Netanyahu finds himself at war in Gaza and at home: "Israel's prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, apologized for accusing military and security officials of lapses that led to the Hamas massacre but declined to accept responsibility himself."

• Whizzy Kim: [10-28] The boycott movement against Israel, explained: It's often said that nobody gives up power without a fight, but it's hard to fight injustice without complicating it. Hence the search for nonviolent resistance and pressure, which have had modest successes, especially in countries where public opinion holds some sway, both locally and among higher powers. BDS played a large role in convincing South Africa to abolish apartheid, so it seemed like an ideal strategy for pressuring Israel into ending its own system of apartheid. We're still in the stage where Israel is pulling out all the stops to keep people in America and Europe from even discussing the prospect. Gag laws, of course, have been tried before, most notoriously in the US to prevent abolitionists from petitioning Congress about slavery. We should understand that had BDS been more successful, Israel may not have blundered its way into the present war.

• Menachem Klein: [10-26] Israel's war cabinet has learned nothing from its failures: "The leaders who oversaw Israel's Gaza policy for 15 years are incapable of abandoning the erroneous ideas that collapsed on Oct. 7."

• Will Leitch: [10-27] Banning Palestinian flags is just the beginning.

• Eric Levitz: [10-27] The suppression of Israel's critics bolsters the case for free speech: Someone get this guy a thesaurus. Bolster: "support or strengthen; prop up." I think I get what he's saying, but I can't figure out a way to rephrase his title. The weak link is "the case," as no way suppression of anything "bolsters free speech." "The case" turns a real argument about who's allowed to say what into an abstract right, where liberals have to defend the rights of assholes to spew hate and lies in order to justify their own right to say something sensible and helpful.

• Richard Luscombe: [10-27] Ron DeSantis's claim he sent military equipment to Israel unravels. Well, it's the thought that counts. On the other hand, Edward Helmore: [10-29] Ron DeSantis defends call to ban pro-Palestinian groups from Florida colleges is totally on-brand.

• Ian S Lustick: [10-13] Vengeance is not a policy: "Emotionally driven reactions from Washington won't prevent future violence. Dismantling the Gaza prison could."

• Eldar Mamedov: [10-25] EU's vaunted unity is disintegrating over Gaza crisis.

• Neil MacFarquhar: [10-23] Developing world sees double standard in West's actions in Gaza and Ukraine.

• Ruth Margalit: [10-19] The devastation of Be'eri: "In one day, Hamas militants massacred, tortured, and abducted residents of a kibbutz, leaving their homes charred and their community in ruins." This doesn't excuse that, or is excused by any of the chain of outrages that came before, as far back as Deir Yassin (1948) or Qibya (1953) or, in Gaza itself, in Khan Yunis and Rafah (1956). But one shouldn't look away, because, regardless of the perpetrators and victims, this is what it looks like.

• Stephen Mihm: [10-26] Many evangelicals see Israel-Hamas war as part of a prophecy: If you weren't brought up on "Revelations," this seems like lunacy, but if you were, you have damn little incentive to try to allay the threat of war in the region.

• Mahmoud Mushtaha: [10-24] If we survive the bombs, what will remain of our lives?

• Nicole Narea: [10-28] Hezbollah, the Iran-backed Lebanese militant group, explained: "Why would Hezbollah enter the fight against Israel?" People forget that in 2006 Israel was attacking Gaza before Hezbollah started firing rockets into North Israel, triggering the 2006 Israel-Lebanon War. They succeeded in relieving Gaza, but Israel did an enormous amount of bombing damage to Lebanon, then attempted a ground incursion to rout out Hezbollah, and got beat back pretty bad. Since then, they've had occasional skirmishes, especially over the disputed Bekaa Farms, but neither side has wanted to reopen a full-scale war. Israel has, however, bombed Hezbollah and/or Iranian troops in Syria quite a few times, without reprisals from Lebanon or Iran, so there's an itch they'd like to scratch.

• AW Ohlheiser: [10-29] Why some Palestinians believe social media companies are suppressing their posts. I don't know much about this, but I do know that my wife was threatened with a Facebook ban and responded by "algospeak" (not her term). Hard for me to tell, as I rarely post anything but links to my pieces, and occasional pictures of food, but I've seen little evidence that my pieces are even read, much less by people who hate them and try to ban me. But algorithms? That's possible.

• Wendy Pearlman: [10-30] Collective punishment in Gaza will not bring Israel security: "Scholarship suggests the overwhelming violence unleashed on the strip is not just a violation of international law -- it is militarily ineffective."

• Vijay Prashad: [10-26] The everyday violence of life in occupied Palestine. Prashad also wrote, with Zoe Alexandra: [10-27] When the journalists are gone, the stories will disappear.

• Adam Rasgon/David D Kirkpatrick: [10-20] Another hospital in Gaza is bleeding: Speaking with Dr Omar Al-Najjar: "Gaza is the place we were born and raised. However much they try to frighten and scare us, I agree with my family that I can't ever leave Gaza."

• David Remnick: [10-28] In the cities of killing: Long report on the ground, with history, but Not as much "what comes after" as advertised.

• Richard E Rubenstein: [10-27] Conflict resultion and the war in Gaza: Beyond the "bad actor" perspective.

• Sigal Samuel: [10-27] Palestinians fear they're being displaced permanently. Here's why that's logical. He doesn't mention the Peel Commission (1937), but they recommended partition of Palestine with forced transfer, a policy which David Ben-Gurion applauded -- publicly for the first time, although his adoption of the "Hebrew labor" doctrine made it clear that an emerging Israel would do everything it could to drive Palestinians away. That's what they did on a massive scale in 1948-50, but after that it got more difficult. Ben-Gurion advised against war in 1967 because he recognized that Palestinians wouldn't flee any more: they would stay in place, and Israel would be stuck with them, sinking the Jewish majority he had engineered by 1950. But the dream and desire to expel was always there, with the settler movement on the front lines, becoming ever more aggressive as they increased political leverage.

• Benzion Sanders: [10-28] I fought for the I.D.F. in Gaza. It made me fight for peace. "When my Israeli infantry unit arrived at the first village in Gaza, in July 2014, we cleared houses by sending grenades through windows, blowing doors open and firing bullets into rooms to avoid ambush and booby traps." And: "All our casualties and the suffering brought on Palestinians in Gaza accomplished nothing since our leaders refused to work on creating a political reality in which more violence would not be inevitable." Also see: Ariel Bernstein: [09-29] I fought house to house in Gaza . . . I know force alone won't bring peace.

• Jon Schwarz: Hamas attack provides "rare opportunity" to cleanse Gaza, Israeli think tank says.

• Adam Shatz: [11-02] Vengeful pathologies. This well-crafted essay stops short of considering the pros and cons of genocide, which would push the conflict into uncharted territory, but draws on the long history of colonial conflict as well as recent Israel/Palestine, where "its political class lacks the imagination and creativity -- not to mention the sense of justice, of other people's dignity -- required to pursue a lasting agreement." A couple quotes:

  One is reminded of Frantz Fanon's observation that 'the colonised person is a persecuted person who constantly dreams of becoming the persecutor.' On 7 October, this dream was realised for those who crossed over into southern Israel: finally, the Israelis would feel the helplessness and terror they had known all their lives. The spectacle of Palestinian jubilation -- and the later denials that the killing of civilians had occurred -- was troubling but hardly surprising. In colonial wars, Fanon writes, 'good is quite simply what hurts them most.'

  What hurt the Israelis nearly as much as the attack itself was the fact that no one had seen it coming.

  Shatz notes that "many analogies have been proposed for Al-Aqsa Flood," then argues for the 1955 Philippeville uprising where:

  Peasants armed with grenades, knives, clubs, axes and pitchforks killed -- and in many cases disembowelled -- 123 people, mostly Europeans but also a number of Muslims. To the French, the violence seemed unprovoked, but the perpetrators believed they were avenging the killing of tens of thousands of Muslims by the French army, assisted by settler militias, after the independence riots of 1945. In response to Philippeville, France's liberal governor-general, Jacques Soustelle, whom the European community considered an untrustworthy 'Arab lover', carried out a campaign of repression in which more than ten thousand Algerians were killed. By over-reacting, Soustelle fell into the FLN's trap: the army's brutality drove Algerians into the arms of the rebels, just as Israel's ferocious response is likely to strengthen Hamas at least temporarily, even among Palestinians in Gaza who resent its authoritarian rule.

  Already, the 10/7 attacks, unprecedented in scale as they were, have been dwarfed by Israel's overreaction. And while demographics and modern war technology won't allow a repeat of Algeria, Israel still has a lot to lose in its quest for vengeance.

• Raja Shehadeh: [10-26] The uprooting of life in Gaza and the West Bank: A friendly reminder that "Palestinians are determined not to be displace."

• Kevin Sieff/Noga Tarnopolsky/Miriam Berger/William Booth/David Ovalle: [10-24] In Israel, Macron proposes using anti-ISIS coalition against Hamas. It's really mind-boggling that the leader of a country which made such a complete and utter disaster of its colonialist adventure in Algeria could want to come back for more. But even if this isn't just some deep-seated muscle memory from the golden age of European imperialism, even if it's just sheer opportunism on Macron's part, how smart is it to want to be remembered for aiding and abetting genocide? Lots of western politicians have embarrassed themselves fawning over Israel lately, but this takes the cake.

• Richard Silverstein:

  [10-25] Israeli Cabinet orders murders of senior Hamas leaders and families: "Ministers tasked IDF and Shin Bet with mass assassinations, invoking a Biblical verse commanding extermination of Amalek.

  • [10-26] Israel murders Al Jazeera bureau chief's family: "Part of a plan to assassinate Palestinian leaders, media figures, and families."

• Norman Solomon: [10-30] Biden is a genocide denier and the 'enabler in chief' for Israel's ongoing war crimes. It kind of looks like that, doesn't it?

• Ishaan Tharoor:

  • [10-29] Israel's Gaza offensive stirs a wave of global protest: This is the only really heartening thing to come out of this month. For many years, Palestinians have been divided between factions (like Hamas) set on fighting for their rights, and others appealing to nonviolent change: to decent public opinion, international law, and the subtle pressure of BDS. Israel has done everything possible to fight both, especially by turning them against each other, and they've done a pretty good job of locking up political elites in the US and Europe with their campaign against "terrorism." But large numbers of people, even in media markets saturated with Israeli talking points, still see through that. And once their eyes open up, further genocide will only further estrange Israel from what we'd like to think of as the civilized world.

  • [10-25] Israel says Hamas 'is ISIS.' But it's not.

  • [10-27] The brutal logic of tying colorful pieces of string around children's wrists in Gaza.

• Nick Turse: [10-24] Secret U.S. war in Lebanon is tinder for escalation of Israel-Gaza conflict: "Billions in security aid to Lebanon, along with off-the-books commandos, could embroil the U.S. in a regional conflagration."

• Kelley Beaucar Vlahos: [10-27] 'Tit-for-tat' after US retaliates against Iranian targets: "F-16s struck what Pentagon said were IRGC-backed militias on Friday."

• Bret Wilkins: [10-25] 40 faith leaders lead Gaza pray-in at House Minority Leader Jeffries' DC office. I'd nominate this for Seth Meyers' "The Kind of Stories We Need Now" segment. Wilkins also wrote:

  • [10-27] 'Never again for anyone': Jewish protesters demanding Gaza cease-fire arrested in Grand Central Station.

  • [10-30] Israeli war on Gaza sparks 'largest mass mobilization of Jews in American history'.

  • [10-27] Israeli officials' plans to ethnically cleanse, recolonize Gaza stoke 'Second Nakba' fears: "Meanwhile, West Bank settlers are vowing to slaughter Palestinians, leaving bloody dolls and leaflets with warnings to flee or die."

  • [10-26] Biden accused of 'genocide denial' after casting doubt on civilian death toll in Gaza.

• Li Zhou: [10-25] What unites the global protests for Palestinian rights: Given the near unanimity of the US political caste in its fealty to Israel (e.g., the Senate voted 97-0 to denounce a ceasefire), you may be surprised by how many people all around the world demonstrating for Palestinian rights, the most basic of which is not to be slaughtered by Israeli bombers and left to starve in the rubble. The messages and emphases vary, but the most basic one in the US, where Jewish Voice for Peace and If Not Now have been especially active, is to call for an immediate ceasefire.

Also on X (Twitter):

• Peter Beinart: [Response to Yair Wallach: Last night, settlers invaded the village of Susya (South Hebron hills) and ordered its residents to leave within 24 hours -- otherwise they would all be killed.] All year we've been screaming that this would happen. No establishment American Jewish leader said a word. As far as I know, they still haven't. [Link to Beinart's article: [04-13] Could Israel carry out another Nakba? "Expulsionist sentiment is common in Israeli society and politics. To ignore the warning sign is to abdicate responsibility."]

• Ryan Grim: Holy shit -- it looks like the Western media mistranslated a doctor's guess that there were more than 500 killed or wounded by the hospital bombing, and just went with killed.

  Then the press found that fewer than 500 were killed and the president of the United States told the world the numbers from the health ministry can't be trusted.

  Astounding combination of arrogance and ignorance all in the service of unchecked slaughter.

  [Continuing in comment] The error flowed, I think, from the Western media's lack of interest in Palestinians as people. If one dies, we put them in a spreadsheet, because we know on some level it's bad when civilians are killed.

  But if one is only wounded -- a leg blown off, a concussion, what have you -- that's not interesting to us, and you very rarely see stats for killed and wounded in the Western press -- only killed. Or "died," usually.

  But people in Gaza, such as this doctor in question, do care about the wounded as well as the killed. So he mentioned both, and we simply didn't hear him, because it doesn't matter to us if a Palestinian civilian is only hurt but not killed in a bombing.

• Katie Halper: Jews pretending to be "afraid" of "antisemitic" protests: They're protests against Israeli genocide. It's you genocidal fascists who put us Jews in danger by conflating Jewishness & zionism & perpetuating the antisemitic myth that all Jews support Israel. You don't speak for us.

• Tony Karon: Some mealy-mouthed efforts by the Biden Administration to distance itself from Israel's war crimes in Gaza do nothing to alter its culpability. The only credible way to prevent further mass slaughter of civilians is to force a cease-fire. [Link to: US says Israel must distinguish between Hamas targets and civilians. Israel will just say Hamas is using "human shields," as if that's all the excuse they need. They don't distinguish between targets and civilians because they don't make the distinction.]

• Tony Karon: Contra to @JoeBiden's ham-handed efforts to equate Hamas with Russia, it is Israel that is following Putin's playbook. In the second Chechnya war, he supervised Russian forces flattening Grozny, and killing 18,000 people in the first weeks of his assault.

• Tony Karon: Colonialism is deeply embedded in the BBC's DNA, which is why every report on horrors being inflicted by Israel's 'pacification' violence must be qualified by the colonizer's own spin. Clearly, @BBC bosses believe the Israeli version. They would, though, wouldn't they? [Robert Wright commented: Or it could be that, like many people, whoever wrote this doesn't know the difference between "refute" and "rebut".] Karon continued: Not really, because it's a pattern -- literally every report on the horrors unfolding in Gaza on their web site is accompanied by a disclaimer worthy of Walter Isaacson's 2001 instruction to his CNN staff to downplay and spin civilian casualties in Afghanistan.

• Arsen Ostrovsky: [Over aerial video of a massive protest in London] This isn't a pro-Palestinian rally in London now, it's a pro-Hamas rally.

  Churchill is probably rolling in his grave.
  Jon "Pumpkinhead" Schwarz commented: Churchill probably would be upset about these demonstrations, given that he referred to Palestinians as animals ("the dog in the manger") who had no right to be upset by being replaced by "a higher grade race"

• Nathan J Robinson: This is an important point. If the British had responded to IRA attacks on civilians by launching relentless air strikes on Irish civilian neighborhoods, it would have appeared obviously psychopathic and deranged. Yet in Gaza this is considered a reasonable response to terror.

• David Sheen: Israeli TV running a counter of fatalities in Gaza -- most of whom are civilians and many of whom are children --under the heading "terrorists we eliminated". And for those too lazy to drive to Sderot to watch the genocide, they've got you covered with a livestream of the bombing.

  Tikun Olam commented: Language betrays the immorality and genocide. Here are a few other statistics: 8,000 Gaza dead -- 3,000 children. 45% of homes destroyed. 1.5-million refugees. 10 of 35 hospitals shut down due to lack of supplies & power.

• Rabbi Alissa Wise: This is Netanyahu telling the world he plans genocide. So even if 8000 dead and cutting off connection to the rest of the world and access to food & water didnt convince you, now you know. ACT NOW! [Refers to Netanyahu quote, video included: "You must remember what Amalek has done to you, says our Holy Bible"]

  Elsewhere, Barnett R. Rubin explains Netanyahu's bible quote: For those unfamiliar with the reference, here it is: I Samuel 15: 3-4: Now go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass.

  Tony Karon adds: Here, @POTUS, is your deranged partner in war crime pledging to commit Biblically-inspired genocide. That Palestinian death toll you don't want to hear about? Is that because you know you could have prevented it?

Trump, and other Republicans: Big news this week, aside from Trumps trials and fulminations, was the election of Mike Johnson (R-LA) as Speaker of the House. So he's getting some press, raising the question of why anyone who thought Jim Jordan was too toxic could imagine that he'd be any more tolerable.

• Kyle Anzalone: [10-27] New House Speaker: Russia, China, and Iran are the new axis of evil. Also: "Hamas and Hezbollah are proxies of Iran, and they're tied in now with Russia and China." I guess that's good news for people worried about keeping the government funded, as you can't fight WWIII during a government shutdown.

• David Badash: [10-30 Why did Mike Johnson scrub 69 podcasts from his website?

• Devlin Barrett/Perry Stein: [10-29] The Trump trials: Cannon fodder: "Welcome back to The Trump Trials, our weekly effort to keep readers up to date on the many criminal -- and civil -- cases the 45th president is fighting in federal and state courts."

• Noah Berlatsky: [10-30] The Christofascism of Mike Johnson: "The new House speaker is an opposition researcher's goldmine."

• Andrea Bernstein/Andy Kroll: [10-27] Trump's court whisperer had a state judicial strategy. Its full extent only became clear years later. Leonard Leo.

• Gabrielle Bluestone: [10-27] Michael Cohen waited five years for this: He didn't just wait. He did time in jail for Trump. Admittedly, not very hard time, but enough to know that people should pay for their crimes.

• Jonathan Chait: [10-26] Republican 'moderates' caved. Wow, that never happens. "Except always.

• Chas Danner: [10-28] Mike Pence acknowledges reality: He "suspended" his presidential campaign, after widespread reports of bankruptcy.

• Norman Eisen/Amy Lee Copeland: [10-29] Jenna Ellis could become a star witness against Trump. She became the third of Trump's lawyers, after Kenneth Chesebro and Sidney Powell, to plead guilty to racketeering charges in Georgia.

• Katelyn Fossett: [10-27] 'He seems to be saying his commitment is to minority rule': Interview with Kristin Kobes Du Mez on "the Christian nationalist ideas that shaped House Speaker Mike Johnson."

• Rebecca Gordon: [10-24] Trump's Schedule F (for "failed state"): "Republican contradictions: Are they fascists or nihilists -- or both?"

• Margaret Hartmann: [10-27] 15 not-fun facts about Speaker Mike Johnson. For a more comprehensive accounting, see Anna Canizales/Michael Kruse: [10-26] 55 things you need to know about Mike Johnson.

• Ben Jacobs: [10-29] "Lord of the Flies": The House's chaotic next era, explained: "New House Speaker Mike Johnson faces a long to-do list and a caucus with short patience for compromise."

• Sarah Jones: [10-28] Mike Johnson's old-time religion.

• Ed Kilgore:

  • [10-26] North Carolina gerrymander boosts odds of GOP holding house.

  • [10-27] Mike Johnson's election denial should raise alarms for 2024.

  • [10-27] Blake Masters lands in another nasty intra-MAGA primary.

• Paul Krugman: [10-26] The GOP goes full-on extremist: Meet Mike Johnson.

• Meredith McGraw/Alex Isenstadt: [10-24] 'I killed him': How Trump torpedoes Tom Emmer's speaker bid.

• Nia Prater: [10-25] Trump takes the stand, gets fined again.

• Andrew Prokop:

  • [10-25] 3 winners and 3 losers from the House speaker circus. Losers include "Anyone dreaming about bipartisanship" and "The stability of the US electoral system." Winners include Donald Trump and "GOP hardliners."

  • [10-28] The "uniparty": The far-right obsession driving GOP chaos, explained.

• David Rothkopf: [10-26] Here's why Mike Johnson is more dangerous than Donald Trump.

• Greg Sargent: [10-27] Mike Johnson's conspiracy theories about 'illegals' mark a new GOP low.

• Laura Vozzella: [10-29] Youngkin 'purge' removed nearly 3,400 legal Virginia voters from rolls.

Biden and/or the Democrats:

• David French: [10-29] Joe Biden knows what he's doing: Biden's "support among Democrats has slipped 11 points in the past month to 75 percent, the lowest of his presidency." Much of that has to do with his handling of Israel's war against Gaza, where in public he's offered total support for Israeli aggression, regardless of any reservations he may have communicated in private. It's possible that he may eventually moderate Israel's lust for vengeance, but it seems very unlikely to me that he "knows what he is doing." That's because so very few Americans have any sort of objective understanding of Israel, or for that matter of American power when it is threatened or humbled. If you want examples, just look at the fine print in French's piece, especially when he argues against a ceasefire.

• Ed Kilgore: [10-27] Biden's age is primary challenger Dean Phillips's only issue. The Congressman (D-MN) decides to take a flyer, not over a political disupte but doubts of Biden's "electability" (which isn't exactly age, but close to it). Cites a profile by Tim Alberta in The Atlantic, "timed to appear the day of his announcement."

• Jennifer Rubin: [10-29] Labor wins bolster Biden's strategy. For example, breakthroughs in the auto workers strikes (although I'd give the UAW most of the credit):

• Jeanne Whalen/Lauren Kaori Gurley:

  • [10-26] Ford workers praise new UAW contract: 'This will change so many lives'.

  • [10-28] UAW reaches tentative deal with Stellantis but escalates strike against GM.

  • Alex N Press: [10-30] The UAW now has tentative deals with all three automakers -- and they look to be historic. General Motors was the last holdout.

Legal matters and other crimes:

• Ian Millhiser:

  • [10-24] The Supreme Court confronts its own failure in an appalling case about guns: "The justices are seriously considering whether domestic abusers have a right to own a gun."

  • [10-27] The Supreme Court must decide if it wants to own Twitter.

Climate and environment:

• Scott Dance:

  • [09-26] One of the most intense El Niños ever observed could be forming.

  • [10-04] September shattered global heat record -- and by a record margin.

  • [10-09] These are places that could become 'unlivable' as the Earth warms.

  • /Scott Mooney: [10-23] West Antarctic ice sheet faces 'unavoidable' melting, a warning for sea level rise.

• Umair Irfan/Benji Jones: [10-26] How Hurricane Otis defied forecasts and exploded into a deadly storm overnight. The Pacific hurricane intensified extraordinarily fast to reach category 5, before hitting Acapulco.

• Christopher Ketcham: [10-29] When idiot savants do climate economics: "How an elite clique of math-addled economists hijacked climate policy." Starts with William Nordhaus.

• Elizabeth Kolbert: [10-26] Hurricane Otis and the world we live in now.

• Ian Livingston: [10-24] Earth's climate shatters heat records. These 5 charts show how.

• Kasha Patel: [09-25] Antarctica just hit a record low in sea ice -- by a lot.

• Matt Stieb: [10-26] Scenes of the destruction in Acapulco after Hurricane Otis.

Ukraine War:

• Connor Echols: [10-27] Diplomacy Watch: Ukraine and Russia are (quietly) talking: Very quietly, not about much.

• Francesca Ebel/Serhil Korolchuk: [10-28] Russia and Ukraine intensify fight over Avdiivka, another ruined city.

• William Hartung: [10-27] Aid for Israel and Ukraine is not an American jobs program: "Biden shifted gears and is now leaning into the false notion that money to these countries would yield economic benefits for us."

• Anatol Lieven: [10-25] What they mean when they say America is 'indispensable': "it's really just code for 'primacy.'"

Around the world:

• Lautaro Grinspan: [10-23] How young Argentines might put a far-right libertarian into power: Javier Milei, who if elected would probably become the very worst national president in the world today. He was the surprise leader in the primary round, but fell to second place in last Sunday's first-round election. (It's kind of a screwy system.)

Other stories:

Kelly Denton-Borhaug: [10-29] The dehumanization of war (please don't kill the children): Always two titles at this site, so I figured use both, for this "meditation for Veterans Day," which I could have filed under Israel or Ukraine or possibly elsewhere, but thought I'd let it stand alone. Starts in Hiroshima, 1945 with what Stalin would have called a "statistic," then focuses in on a 10-year-old girl, whose mother was reduced to "an unrecognizable block of ash," with only a single gold tooth to identify her. The author has a book about American soldiers but the theme is universal: And Then Your Soul Is Gone: Moral Injury and U.S. War-Culture.

Lloyd Green: [10-29] Romney: A Reckoning review: must-read on Mitt and the rise of Trump: "McKay Coppins and his subject do not hold back in a biography with much to say about the collapse of Republican values." Also on the Romney book:

• Michael Luo: [10-23] Did Mitt Romney save his soul?

John Herrman: [10-27] What happens when ads generate themselves? I wish this was the most important article of the week. This is a subject I could really drill down hard on, not least because I think advertising is one of the most intrinsically evil artifacts of our world. And because "artificial intelligence" is a pretty sick oxymoron.

Bruce E Levine: [10-27] Why failed psychiatry lives on: Seems like someone I would have gained much from reading fifty years ago (although R.D. Laing, Thomas Szasz, Paul Goodman, and Neil Postman worked for me).

Sophie Lloyd: [10-28] Disney's 8 biggest mistakes in company's history: I wouldn't normally bother with a piece like this, but as mistakes go, these are pretty gross. I mean, after their treatment of slavery and Indians, and their mistreatment of lemmings, number eight was an omnibus "A long history of sexism."

James C Nelson: [10-27] Just another day in NRA paradise: I suppose I have to note that another crazy person with an assault rifle killed 18 and injured 13 more in Lewiston, Maine, last week. This article is as good a marker as any. You know the drill. If you want an update: Kelly McClure: [10-27] Suspect in Maine mass shootings found dead.

Will Oremus/Elizabeth Dwoskin/Sarah Ellison/Jeremy B Merrill: [10-27] A year later, Musk's X is tilting right. And sinking.

Nathan J Robinson: I could have split these up all over today's post, but want to point out the common source of so much insight:

• [10-27] They're all "extremists": "The Republican Party has long been pushing us toward an apocalyptic dystopian future. The differences between individual Republicans are far less important than their similarities." My only question is why the quotes? "Extremists" is plainly descriptive, and hardly controversial.

• [10-26] How the occupation of Palestine shapes everyday life -- and what happens now: Interview with Nathan Thrall, former director of the Arab-Israeli Project at the International Crisis Group, and author of The Only Language They Understand: Forcing Compromise in Israel and Palestine, and most recently A Day in the Life of Abed Salama: Anatomy of a Jerusalem Tragedy. Thrall lives in Jerusalem, but has recently been trying to promote his book in the UK, noting:

  I have never seen this degree of intolerance for any sort of nuance in the discussion of Israel-Palestine, for any discussion of root causes, even just expression of sympathy for Palestinians living under occupation. We've seen events canceled in the UK and the US, hotels refusing to host long planned Palestinian conferences. A concert in London was shut down, and my own book event was shut down in London by the UK police. And of course, what made headlines was the prize in Germany that was going to be given to a Palestinian author. And you saw that the UK Home Secretary had said -- the police, of course, are not going to follow through on this -- but she recommended to the police to arrest anyone, or to consider arresting anyone, with a Palestinian flag. We saw in France that they were banning Palestinian protests. It's really a very difficult moment to speak with any kind of intelligence or nuance about this issue.

  I've occasionally noted instances of repression emanating from political and cultural elites in the US and Europe, clearly aimed at shutting down any discussion, much less protest, against all the violence in and around Gaza, but I haven't seriously tracked it, because this assault on free speech and democracy seems like the less urgent tragedy. But it's happening. And it reminds me of 9/11: not the shocking initial event, but the chilling efforts to keep anyone but the warmongers from speaking, allowing them the illusion of cheering applause as they went ahead with their ill-considered and ultimately self-destructive program.

• [10-25] "Libs of Tiktok" is Orwell's "two minutes hate": "The right-wing social media account is viciopus and dehumanizing. Its revolting toxicity shows us why empathy and solidarity are so important."

• [10-23] The wisdom of Edward Said has never been more relevant. Article includes extensive quotes.

Jeffrey St Clair: [10-27] Roaming Charges: That oceanic feeling. Lead section on climate change (remember that?) and environment. I didn't realize that small planes still burn leaded gasoline. Then the dirt on Mike Johnson. Then a much longer list of criminal injustices. Plus other things, like a Nikki Haley quote ("I'm tired of talking about a Department of Defense. I want a Department of Offense.")

Evaggelos Vallianatos: [10-27] Slauighter of the American buffalo: Article occasioned by the Ken Burns documentary, which may be an eye-opener if you don't know the story, and adds details if you do. It is a classic case of how insatiable world markets suck the life out of nature, and how the infinite appetites of financiers, who've reduced everything to the question of how much more money their money can make.

Richard D Wolff: [10-27] Why capitalism cannot finally repress socialism. This assumes that some measure of sanity must prevail. And yes, I know that's a tautology, as socialism is the sanity that keeps capitalism from tearing itself apart and dissolving into chaos.

Nothing from The New Republic this week, as they decided I'm "out of free articles," even though I'm pretty sure we have a valid subscription. Not much there that isn't elsewhere, although I clicked on close to ten articles that looked interesting, before giving up, including one called Kyrsten Sinema's Delusional Exit Interview. AlterNet has a similar article: Carl Gibson: [10-30] 'I don't care': Kyrsten Sinema plans to cash in on Senate infamy if she loses reelection in 2024.

Daily Log

Albert Einstein quote found on Facebook: "Peace cannot be kept by force; it can only be achieved by understanding."

Another Einstein quote: "Mankind invented the atomic bomb, but no mouse would ever construct a mousetrap."

Onion headline: Biden Expresses Doubts That Enough Palestinians Have Died. Article quotes Biden as saying: "I have no confidence that the death toll provided by the Hamas-run Ministry of Health is as high as it should be." Less authentically, "Perhaps when the fog of war has cleared, we'll realize Israel has killed more Palestinians than necessary, but now is not the time to ease up." No one in the "fog of war" recognizes it as such.

An earlier Onion headline: U.S. warns a Gaza cease fire would only benefit humanity.

Music Week

Expanded blog post, October archive (in progress).

Tweet: Music Week: 44 albums, 1 A-list

Music: Current count 41047 [41003] rated (+44), 31 [27] unrated (+4).

I took an extra day this weekend. I decided to hold off starting Speaking of Which until late Saturday, and then write intro instead of searching for links. I struggled Sunday with what turned out to be a false start, then wrote yet another intro, taking a break midway to collect some links. It got late, and I decided I should hold off and write up the missing outline points Monday afternoon. Took most of the day before I posted.

I then did the cutover for Music Week, but by then I didn't feel like writing any form of this intro, so I sat on it until Tuesday, fairly late. Tuesday afternoon got wiped out in grocery shopping, a first pass toward a birthday dinner later this week. Frankly, I'd rather think about that than this, but last week is in the bag, so I might as well wrap it up quick.

Next week will be short. I seriously doubt I'll get any listening in until Saturday. I certainly won't be starting another Speaking of Which. And I wouldn't mind just punting for the year. The world has a long ways to go to catch up with what I've written already.

What I do hope to write about next week is the 18th Annual Francis Davis Jazz Poll. I've set up the result directory locally, so I need to post that. The main thing I want to do in the next couple weeks is to expand the voter list. To that end, I'm trying to take a more systemmatic survey of who's writing what. I'd like to extend invites to another 30-50 critics -- probably half outside the US, which (I don't have a reliable count, so I'm only guessing) could double the number of non-US critics. I doubt this will skew the results much, but it should broaden the base. That would be a big plus for people like me who find the bottom two-thirds of the list more interesting than the winners.

As for this week, I started off with a premature jazz ballot, where half of the records selected were unheard by me. The Miles Davis archival piece got me looking at recent Fresh Sound reissues, mostly albums from the 1990s when Jordi Pujols set up sessions with many of his cool jazz heroes, and I wanted to hear them all. (I already knew several, especially with Herb Geller and Bud Shank, and also some very good Charlie Mariano records.)

Then I read that John Zorn's Tzadik records are returning to streaming platforms. (I followed them fairly close before they picked up their toys and headed home.) Tzadik is much more than Zorn's personal label, but he's so prolific all I managed this week was his own 2023 releases (plus a couple slightly older).

Still reading Christopher Clark's Revolutionary Spring, now almost 600 pages in, as the revolutionary hopes get dashed by right-wingers. While I'm not a fan of violence coming or going, that coming from the right is always particularly bitter.

New records reviewed this week:

• Afro Peruvian New Trends Orchestra: Cosmic Synchronicities (2023, Blue Spiral): [cd]: B+(***)
• Dmitry Baevsky: Kid's Time (2022, Fresh Sound New Talent): [sp]: B+(***)
• Ron Blake: Mistaken Identity (2021 [2023], 7ten33 Productions): [cd]: B+(***)
• Flying Pooka! [Dani Oore & Florian Hoefner]: The Ecstasy of Becoming (2021 [2023], Alma): [cd]: B+(*)
• Louis Hayes: Exactly Right! (2022 [2023], Savant): [sp]: B+(**)
• Marie Kruttli: Transparence (2022 [2023], Intakt): [sp]: B+(*)
• Martin Lutz Group: LoLife/HiLife (2023, Gateway, 2CD): [sp]: B+(***)
• Mendoza Hoff Revels: Echolocation (2023, AUM Fidelity): [sp]: B+(***)
• Azuka Moweta & Anioma Brothers Band: Nwanne Bu Ife (2022, Palenque): [bc]: B+(***)
• Gard Nilssen's Supersonic Orchestra: Family (2022 [2023], We Jazz): [sp]: A-
• Ivo Perelman/Nate Wooley: Polarity 2 (2023, Burning Ambulance): [bc]: B+(**)
• Precarious Towers: Ten Stories (2023, Shifting Paradigm): [sp]: B+(***)
• Matana Roberts: Coin Coin Chapter Five: In the Garden (2023, Constellation): [sp]: B+(**)
• Jim Rotondi Quintet: Over Here (2023, Criss Cross): [r]: B+(**)
• Chris Speed Trio: Despite Obstacles (2022 [2023], Intakt): [sp]: B+(***)
• Terell Stafford: Between Two Worlds (2023, Le Coq): [sp]: B+(***)
• Sufjan Stevens: Javellin (2023, Asthmatic Kitty): [sp]: B+(*)
• True Stomach of a Bird [Ulf Mengersen/Lina Allemano/Kamil Korolczuk]: Computation Intensive Spontaneousness (2023, self-released): [sp]: B+(*)
• Andrea Veneziani: The Lighthouse (2022 [2023], self-released): [cdr]: A-
• Jamila Woods: Water Made Us (2023, Jagjaguwar): [sp]: B+(***)
• Peter Xifaras: Fusion (2023, Music With No Expiration): [cdr]: B+(*)
• John Zorn: New Masada Quartet (2021, Tzadik): [sp]: A-
• John Zorn: New Masada Quartet, Vol. 2 (2022 [2023], Tzadik): [sp]: B+(***)
• John Zorn: The Fourth Way (2022 [2023], Tzadik): [sp]: B+(***)
• John Zorn: 444 (2022 [2023], Tzadik): [sp]: B
• John Zorn: Multiplicities: A Repository of Non-Existent Objects (2022, Tzadik): [sp]: B+(*)
• John Zorn: Multiplicites II: A Repository of Non-Existent Objects (2023, Tzadik): [sp]: B+(**)
• John Zorn/Bill Laswell: Memoria (2023, Tzadik): [sp]: B+(*)
• John Zorn: Quatrain (2023, Tzadik): [sp]: B+(*)
• John Zorn: Full Fathom Five (2023, Tzadik): [sp]: B+(**)
• John Zorn: Homenaje A Remedios Varo (2023, Tzadik): [sp]: B+(***)
• John Zorn: Nothing Is as Real as Nothing (2023, Tzadik): [sp]: B+(**)

Recent reissues, compilations, and vault discoveries:

• Gabe Baltazar Quartet: Birdology (1992 [2023], Fresh Sound): [bc]: A-
• Basie All Stars: Live at Fabrik Vol. 1: Hamburg 1981 (1981 [2023], Jazzline): [r]: B+(**)
• Eddie Bert Sextet: The Human Factor (1987 [2023], Fresh Sound): [bc]: B+(**)
• Miles Davis Quintet: In Concert at the Olympia Paris 1957 (1957 [2023], Fresh Sound): [bc]: B+(**)
• Jan Lundgren Trio/Herb Geller: Stockholm Get-Together! (1994 [2023], Fresh Sound): [bc]: B+(***)
• Jack Nimitz Quartet: Confirmation (1995 [2023], Fresh Sound): [bc]: B+(***)
• The Dave Pell Octet: Plays Again (1984 [2023], Fresh Sound): [bc]: B+(**)
• Bill Perkins: Perk Plays Prez: Bill Perkins Recreates the Historic Solos of Lester Young (1995 [2023], Fresh Sound): [bc]: B+(***)
• Frank Strazzeri and His Woodwinds West: Somebody Loves Me (1994 [2023], Fresh Sound): [bc]: B+(**)

Old music:

• Eddie Bert Quintet: Kaleidoscope (1953-59 [2005], Fresh Sound): [r]: B+(**)
• Martin Lutz Group: It's Swing Not Rocket Science (2011, Calibrated): [sp]: B+(*)
• Paul Moer Trio: Plays the Music of Elmo Hope (1991 [2023], Fresh Sound): [bc]: B+(***)
• Jack Nimitz and Friends: Yesterday and Today (1957-2007 [2008], Fresh Sound): [sp]: B+(**)

Unpacking: Found in the mail last week:

• Barry Altschul/David Izenson/Perry Robinson: Stop Time: Live at Prince Street, 1978 (NoBusiness) [09-08]
• Peter Brötzmann/Sabu Toyozumi: Triangle: Live at Ohm, 1987 (NoBusiness) [09-08]
• Rob Brown: Oblongata (RogueArt) * [10-09]
• Rob Brown: Oceanic (RogueArt) * [10-09]
• Roy Campbell/William Parker/Zen Matsuura: Visitation of Spirits: The Pyramid Trio Live, 1985 (NoBusiness): [09-08]
• Kim Dae Hwan/Choi Sun Bae: Korean Fantasy (1999, NoBusiness) p[09-08]
• Ahmad Jamal: Emerald City Nights: Live at the Penthouse 1966-1968 (Jazz Detective/Elemental, 2CD): [11-24]
• Jouk Minor/Josef Traindl/Jean Querlier/Christian Lété/Dominique Regef: Enfin La Mer (1978, NoBusiness): [09-08]
• Cal Tjader: Catch the Groove: Live at the Penthouse 1963-1967 (Jazz Detective/Elemental, 2CD): [11-24]

Speaking of Which

Blog link.

After a grueling Speaking of Which last week (9497 words, 125 links), I resolved this week not start my article search until Sunday: partly because many of the week's stories are quickly evolving, but mostly because I said pretty much what I wanted to say last week (and much of it the week before). But the way this column comes together is a lot like surfing: you look around, notice an interesting wave, and try to ride it. The process is very reactive, each little bit giving you a glimpse of some still unparsed whole, further obscured by a sort which obliterates order.

What I want to do this week is to start by making a few points that I think need to be highlighted, as plainly and clearly as possible.

On October 7, Palestinians in Gaza launched a surprise attack on parts of Israel adjacent to the walls surrounding Gaza. The attackers fired about 5,000 rockets over the walls, and about 2,500 fighters infiltrated Israel, attacking military bases, villages, and kibbutzim. On the first day, they killed some 1,200 Israelis, and took some 200 back to Gaza as hostages. Within the next day or two, Israel killed or repelled the infiltrators, and took control back of the checkpoints and wall breaches. From that point, the Palestinian offensive was over.

If you can overlook 75 years since Israel started pushing Palestinian refugees into Gaza, the slaughter on the way to Suez in 1956, the reprisal raids up to 1967, the military rule from 1967 up until the deputization of the PLO under the Oslo Accords, and the blockade and periodic "mowing the grass" since 2006; if you can put all of that out of mind, as well as the recent rash of settler pogroms in the West Bank, and the encroachment on the Al-Aqsa mosque, and the disinterest of other Arab leaders as they negotiate alliances with Israel and the US, then sure, the attack was unprovoked, savage, and shocking. But given how systematically Gaza has been isolated, impoverished, and tortured, and given that the evident trend was only getting worse, is it really a surprise that people treated so badly might choose to fight back, even to risk death (which given the how much more power Israel wields was pretty certain)?

The rest of the war -- two weeks so far -- is purely Israel's choice, whether for revenge or for spite, or perhaps, as numerous Israelis have urged, a step toward a "final solution." Israel blames the attacks on Hamas, and has vowed to kill them all (supposedly 40,000, out of a population of 2.1 million), but doesn't discriminate very well. They've already killed four times as many Palestinians as they've lost. And they seem intent on striking the West Bank, Lebanon, and Syria as well. They've vowed to enter Gaza with massive force, to root out and end all resistance. They certainly have the firepower to kill tens and hundreds of thousands. The only question is whether conscience or shame will stop them. It certainly doesn't seem like the United States will dare second guess them.

It's been clear from day one how this will play out. The people who run Israel, from David Ben-Gurion down to the present day, are very smart and very capable. They could have settled this conflict at any step -- certainly any point since 1980, and possibly quite earlier -- but they didn't, because they kept getting away with it, while cultivating the hope for ever greater spoils. But the more they kill, the more they destroy, the more miserable they make the lives of those subject to their whim, the more humanity they lose. America prides itself on being Israel's dearest friend, but what kind of person lets a friend embarrass himself like this? This may once again be a case where no nation stands up against genocide, but it is not one that will easily be forgotten.

"What kind of friend" may be rhetorical, but it's time to take a much harder look at what the US does for and to its allies. The US habitually drags its friends into wars: as with the "coalitions of the willing" in Afghanistan and Iraq, the various lesser "war on terror" projects, and the hopeless war in Ukraine. The US collects tribute in the form of arms purchases. And the US choices of allies (like Israel and Saudi Arabia) and enemies (like Iran, Venezuela, and North Korea, or more seriously Russia and China) taint every ally, as the US has become the world's most recalcitrant rogue state.

It's tempting to blame America's foolhardy foreign policy on the vast power of the military-industrial complex, but what's locked it into place isn't just revolving door corruption, but also the persistence of several really bad ideas, like the notion of "peace through strength," the cult of deterrence, and the great sanctions game. We need a fundamental rethink on security and foreign policy. We need in particular to realize that Israel is not a model we want to follow, but a dead end disaster we need to pull back from. And hopefully convince them to pull back too.

The next section is my "thesis-oriented" original introduction. (I only got down to 13 before scratching it as the lead and writing the newer one above, but will try to knock out the rest before I post on Monday.) Finally, there is another note on foreign policy at the end of the post, which I jotted down back on Saturday. This week's links came out of a very quick scan of sources.

Actually, when I started writing an introduction on Sunday, I intended a numbered list, with about a dozen items on it. What follows is as far as I got, before turning to the shorter statement above.

1. The most basic political division is between Left and Right. The Right believes that human beings sort into hierarchies, where order is ultimately maintained through the threat of force. The Left believes that people are fundamentally equal, and can enter into a political compact for the mutual benefit of all. The Right looks back on a long history of tribal warfare and plunder, which they hold to be the natural order, but really just comes down to their privileges. On the other hand, the Left appeals to those denied respect and privilege, looking forward to our most generous hopes and aspirations.

2. As human society and technology become more complex, as population grows and interacts faster, as people become more conscious of how the world works, traditional hierarchies falter and frustrate. This leads to conflict. Ruling elites never give up power without pressure. Their first instinct when challenged is repression. Even if successful at first, the pressure builds up, and can eventually explode in revolution. The alternative is reform: diluting elite power to better serve more people, channeling conflict into cooperation. Conflict destroys, but consent builds.

3. The modern world is the result of forces of change (mostly driven by science, technology, commerce, and culture), as modulated by bouts of revolution and reform. It is reasonable to view change as an inevitable force. Rigid regimes fight back with repression, risking violent revolution. More flexible regimes accommodate change through reform. Europe was regularly rocked by revolutions from 1789 through 1920, but reform gained ground from the 1830s (in England) on, and has become the rule, especially after 1945. One might also note that counterrevolutions occasionally occurred, but tended to blow up disastrously (most notoriously in Germany, 1933-45).

4. Violence has been a common human trait as far back as anyone can remember. It's been used to dominate, to control, to loot and plunder, both by and against elites. Many of these uses have come to be disparaged, yet in one form or another they persist: I've seen a tally of some 250 wars since the "big one" ended in 1945. Even today, most of us accept the concept that one is entitled to fight back when attacked. The Left was defined in the French Revolution, and most Leftists at least sympathized with the Russians in 1917, and even the Vietnamese in the 1950-70s, but lately the Left in America have become so reform-minded that they are quick to condemn any violence, even in circumstances that have totally closed any hope for peaceful reform. In my opinion, true pacifists are not wrong, but they are out of touch with the human condition (e.g., as in Gaza).

5. As Bertolt Brecht put it, "food first, morals later." Brecht understood that thinking about morality is a luxury that can only be indulged after more basic needs. (Another famous line: "what keeps mankind alive? bestial acts.") Yet when people broke out of their cage in Gaza and immediately killed and maimed people on the other side of the walls, we were immediately lectured by well-meaning Leftists that in order to "talk morally" about the event, we first had to condemn the killers, lest any later explanation of why they killed should sound like an excuse, and thereby expose the morality of the Left to shaming.

6. Morality is a personal belief system that guides one's behavior in normal circumstances. That's probably true for all people, but it particularly matters to Leftists, because our politics is largely dictated by our moral concerns, and that's something we're rather proud of. But it shouldn't be an excuse for arrogance. Morality isn't a license which allows you to condemn people you don't understand, especially when the big thing you don't understand is what other options that person has. Morality may seem absolute, but it's application is always contingent on what options are actually available, and what their consequences may be. On the other hand, where you can reasonably discern other, more moral, options, you might be able to criticize: while, say, Hamas or IDF soldiers may have very limited options, a Prime Minister has options enough to deserve more scrutiny.

7. While morality may guide your political choices, available options are often limited, unclear, compromised, highly contingent -- hence the cliché of always having to vote for "the lesser evil." Many political decisions are made on what amounts to blind trust.

8. The key point to understand about Israel is that it is the result of a settler colonial project, where a foreign imperialist power sponsored and installed an alien population, effectively stripping a native population of most of its rights. There are several dozen similar examples, mostly in the Americas, installed by European empires from 1500 into the mid-1900s. The primary determinant of success was demographic. Settler states remained in charge where immigrants were a clear majority (e.g., Canada, Australia, US), but not where they never came close to majority status (South Africa and Algeria were the most hotly contested. Israel is unusual in several respects: although Zionists began moving to Palestine in the 1880s, the big influx only happened after Britain took over in 1920, reaching about 30% in 1948. Between the partition (expanded during the 1948-50 war), the forced removal of 700,000 Palestinians, and immigration from Europe and Arab lands, Israel's settler population grew to 70% before the 1967 war, when Israel seized more lands with much more Palestinians. Since then, the demographic split is about 50-50, although most Palestinians have no political rights or representation. Israel has managed to retain control through a really extraordinary "matrix of control" (Jeff Halper's term), that is unique in history.

9. Israel shares many characteristics with other settler colonies (especially formerly British ones). First is a strong degree of segregation of the settlers from the natives, and the economic marginalization of the latter. Israel preserved the British colonial legal system, with military control, for Palestinians, while evolving its own system for registered Jews. Laws regarding the sale of land and the permitting of buildings were skewed to siphon off resources. (The US had similar laws, but by 1900 the Native American population had dwindled to the point there was little left to steal, and the reservations, while impoverished, were left as retreats.)

10. There are many unusual things about Israel, but the most important one is that Israel synthesized a new culture, with its own language and an extensive mythology, based on its status as a settlement (before Israel, it was simply the Yishuv). Before aliyah, Jews spoke local languages (like Arabic and German), or creoles (like Ladino and Yiddish). In Israel, they spoke Hebrew. They embellished the long history of Jewish suffering into their own cosmic mantra. They farmed. They fought. They refashioned orthodox Judaism into one that celebrated Israel. And they trained new generations to maintain the settler ethic. The result is a psyche that cannot ease up and do what every other successful settler nation has done: let its native population adjust to a normal life.

11. European settler colonialism reached a sort of peak shortly after 1900, but the two world wars it inspired broke the bank. Britain cut India and Palestine loose in 1947-48, having come up with half-assed partition plans that led to multiple wars. Most of Africa was independent by 1960. France lost Vietnam in 1954, and Algeria in 1962. Nearly every colony had an independence movement. Palestine was, if anything, ahead of the curve, with a major revolt in 1936-39. Today, one is tempted to fault the Palestinians for not seeking some sort of accommodation with the Israelis, but they had reasons to expect more -- probably up to the 1973 war, after which Egypt abandoned them. It is hard for us today to imagine what it felt like to be under a colonialist thumb, but Palestinians knew that all too well.

12. Israelis have a word, "hasbara," which translates to "explaining," but is really more like spin. Zionists have been working their spin on Americans since well before 1947, and they are very good at it. Any time Israel comes up, you can count on constant monitoring of news and opinion sources, with vigorous lobbying to get us to say what they want, in the terms they want us to be using. They've turned the word "terrorist" into a conditioned reflex to kill. The Palestinians they kill are all, if not "terrorists," at least "miltants." We all know that Israel is the "only democracy in the Middle East," even though half the people aren't allowed to vote. The propaganda machine got cranked up to max the moment the Gaza breakout attacks started, and within minutes everyone in America -- at least in upper punditland -- were singing the same hymns. They've created a linguistic cage that is making it difficult to think at all clearly. Long experience makes one wonder: is it really Hamas that attacked Israel, or is Hamas just the target we've been trained to hate? Why is it the "Israel-Hamas War" when Israel is the only one with an army and air force? And when the real target that Israel is pounding isn't Hamas, which is basically invisible, but all of Gaza? After key Israelis threatened to kill literally everyone in Gaza, why aren't we talking about genocide, instead of just some "humanitarian crisis"?

13. Everyone in Israel has an ID card. That ID card specifies your rights, whether you can vote, which courts will try cases you are involved in, where you can go, much more. In America, we have a word for this kind of systematic discrimination based on birth: racism. It's no longer embedded in law, but it is deeply embedded in culture, and it pops up pretty often if you're at all sensitive to it. Racism may not be the right word for what's not just practiced in Israel but enshrined in law, but it's a term that Americans recognize the implications and consequences of.

14. Nationalism was a 19th century European invention, which sought a conservative sense of popular cohesion, at a time when capitalism was going global, intellectuals turned cosmopolitan, and ordinary people were promised a stake in public life. It worked by turning people against other groups, who could be imperial overlords or local minorities (like Jews). Zionism was an attempt to posit a Jewish nationalism, but given the diaspora first had to settle on a land. The Zionists went hat-in-hand to various imperial capitols. The British saw an opportunity, took Palestine from the Ottomans, and the rest is history -- including the rise of a Palestinian nationalism to struggle against the British and the Israelis. Nationalism, even more than the Holocaust, is what binds Israel to Nazi Germany, and what threatens Israel's future. In particular, it's estranging Israel from the cosmopolitan Jewish diaspora.

15. Israel is the most deeply and intensively militaristic nation in the world, possibly in world history. Nearly everyone gets drafted and trained (except Palestinians and ultra-orthodox Jews, although more of the latter are joining). Reserves extend well into middle age, and there are numerous other police and spy agencies. Military leaders move on to dominate the political and business castes. The arms industry is huge, and subsidized not just by the state but by billions of dollars of US aid each year. Treaties with neighbors like Egypt and Jordan have never produced peace dividends. Rather, Israel has always moved on to taunting other "enemies" (Lebanon, Iraq, Iran), plus they've always had the Palestinians to keep down. It's a lot of work keeping enemies riled up at you, but they've developed a taste for it, and can't imagine giving it up.

16. Virtually everyone in the American defense sector is in bed with Israel, but none more so than the neoconservatives, who so admire Israel's unilateral projection of power, their refusal to negotiate, and their willingness to violate norms against assassinations and such that they advocate America adopting the same policies on a global scale. These are the people whose 1990s Project for a New American Century started the campaign to invade Iraq, but they also conspired to bring Likud to power to demolish the Oslo Accords and fire up the 2000 Intifada. The GW Bush administration was run by those same people. While their policies were disastrous, they still exercise enormous influence in Washington. Israel's bad ideas are at least limited by its small size and parochial interests. But American neoconservatives have bigger game in mind, like Russia and China.

17. Americans have always been sympathetic to Israel, though the reasoning involved varies: Christian fundamentalists see a fulfillment of biblical prophecies; many Americans see a kindred settler spirit; neo-imperialists see an ally against Arab ills (nationalism, socialism, Islamism); liberals see an outpost of Western democratic (and capitalist) values (although earlier on leftists were enamored of Israeli socialism); anti-semites see a distant place to put unwanted Jews, and Jews see a thriving refuge for their co-religionists; and military-industrialists see a booming market and a stimulator of other markets. But the political calculations have changed since the 1990s: the Republicans aligned not just with Israel but with the Israeli right; and while many Democrats have become wary of the racism, repression, and belligerence of Israel, very few politicians have been willing to risk punishment by the Israel lobby and their donors. The result is that the US no longer attempts to sanitize or rationalize Israeli positions. Trump and Biden simply jump when commanded, as if America has no interests other than to serve at Israel's feet. This, in turn, has only emboldened the Israeli right to turn ever more viciously on Palestinians.

18. Approximately half of the people subject to Israeli law and enforcement cannot vote in Israel. About 20% of the remainder are nominally Israeli citizens, but are subject to many forms of discrimination. The remainder are Jews from various backgrounds, some intensely religious, some not at all, but almost all unite on their shared fear and loathing of Palestinians. The old divide between right and left has largely disappeared as the welfare state has been trimmed back to a tolerable minimum, leaving as the only real issue the contest of which party appears to be the most barbaric toward the Palestinians. This has allowed the ascendancy of a series of far-right demagogues, which Netanyahu has been agreeable to work with, and has even tried to outflank.

19. Aside from the rump group in the Knesset, which has always remained utterly powerless, there has never been a viable forum for Palestinians to air out their political differences. The PLO was a coalition of groups in exile that never had roots in the Occupied Territories. The Oslo Accords ratified their election as the Palestinian Authority, but when Hamas attempted to enter the political process and challenged Fatah, their wins were thrown out, and no further elections were allowed. (Israel, and America, couldn't abide democratic elections where the wrong people won. Remember the elections promised for 1956 in Vietnam? Eisenhower canceled them for fear of losing to the Communists, leaving them no choice but to fight.) Hamas wound up seizing power in Gaza, which Israel responded to with blockade and bombs. Israel branded Hamas as terrorists, giving them carte blanche to kill whenever it suited them. Fatah, circumscribed in ever tighter circles in the West Bank, remains ineffective, with a stench of corruption. This suits Israelis, who love complaining about having no partner for peace.

20. Israel's far-right turn is built on ethnocentrism, racism, and a strong belief that might makes right. This has largely been led by the settler movement, which kicked off immediately after the 1967 war, and was dedicated to establishing "facts on the ground" that would make it politically impossible for future Israeli leaders to negotiate any "land for peace" deal (like the one with Egypt, which did result in the evacuation of two Israeli settlements; the 2006 removal of Israeli settlements from Gaza was deliberately not negotiated to avoid such appearance). The pace of settlement building in the West Bank accelerated significantly after Oslo, and did much to sabotage peace prospects. Although all Israeli governments from 1967 on have supported the settler movement, the latest government has raised its support to a new level, encouraging settlers to attack Palestinians and drive them from the fields they have been working. This seemed to be a calibrated first step toward forcing Palestinians into exile, although it was still small and tentative -- unlike the post-attack demands that all Gazans move south and flee Gaza into Egypt, or face death as Israel invades. That is exactly the form that genocide would take.

The October 6 attacks were immediately met with a deafening roar of condemnation, at least in America and probably in Europe, even by people who have long been very critical of Israel's brutal occupation and long history of duplicity and propaganda. That's fine on a personal level, but what Israeli leaders were looking for, and what they heard, was assent to respond with violence in even greater orders of magnitude. When one said "terrorism," they heard "kill them all." When one said "this is Israel's 9/11," they heard "it's time for all-out war." And when Israelis threatened genocidal revenge, and got little or no pushback from their old allies, the die was cast. They would bomb and kill until even they couldn't stand it anymore. And it would happen not because of what Hamas did, but because they had started down this road a century ago. (There's a book called Jerusalem 1913 which offers one credible landmark date.) Because no one ever took the threat seriously enough to stop them. Because they pulled the occasional punch and laughed it off. Because we fellow settler colonists secretly admired them.

It's tempting to think that world opinion, not least the rich Americans who bestow so much generosity on Israel, could talk Israel down from this precipice of genocide. In that light, Biden's public embrace and endorsement seems not just foolish but cowardly. I won't argue that it's not. But I'm reminded of something that David Ben-Gurion liked to say: "it only matters what the Jews do." And here, unencumbered by public opinion and other people's morality, they will surely do what they've always wanted to do, and reveal themselves as they truly are. Or at least some of them will: the ones naively given so much deadly power.

[PS: Ben-Gurion said a lot of ridiculous bullshit, so scouring Google for an exact quote is hard and painful. Closest I came to this one was "it does not matter what the goyim say, but what the Jews do." But my memory is more to my point.]

Two more personal items for possible future reference:

• Laura is unhappy with Bernie, as "he can't even call on Israel to stop the bombing!" I think this has something to do with Senate unanimously adopts resolution stating support for Israel. Not only did Sanders vote for the resolution, he didn't call for a ceasefire in a statement he issued calling for food to be allowed in.

• I dug up the link to Laura's "one and only" 2010 poem, which she wrote for a local "poetry slam" event, but continues to be relevant, urgent even.

Calling for a ceasefire should be one of the easiest and sanest things any politician can do. That politicians are reluctant to do so suggests that someone is snapping the whip hard behind them. For instance, I just saw this tweet:

A senior adviser to [UK Labour Party leader Keir Starmer was asked how many Gazans have to die before Labour will call for a ceasefire. The reply came: "As many as it takes . . ."

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Top story threads:

Israel:

• Nicole Narea: [10-19] A timelilne of Israel and Palestine's complicated history. A lot of useful information here, though there are things I'd stress a bit differently.

• Sam Adler-Bell: [10-21] War of the statements: "The unusual way Americans have processed the Israel-Hamas War."

• Zack Beauchamp: [10-20] What Israel should do now: "Israel's current approach is clearly wrong. Here's a better way to fight Hamas -- and win."

• George Beebe/Anatol Lieven: [10-19] How China and Russia can help us avoid escalation in the Middle East: This is a bit fanciful, starting with the assumption that the US wants to "avoid escalation in the Middle East." The underlying point -- that Russia and China could help in cooling down hot spots -- would make more sense if the US wasn't so intent on heating them up.

• Ghousoon Bisharat/Oren Ziv/Baker Zoubi: [10-17] Israel cracks down on internal critics of Gaza war: "Palestinians, as well as some left-wing Jews, are being suspended from studies, fired from jobs, or arested at night -- all because of social media posts."

• Data for Progress: [10-20] Voters agree the US should call for a ceasefire and de-escalation of violence in Gaza to prevent civilian deaths: 66% of all likely voters agree (more or less), including 80% of Democrats, but evidently not Joe Biden.

• Mohammed El-Kurd: [10-20] Western journalists have Palestinian blood on their hands.

• Jarod Facundo: [10-17] Progressive American Jewish groups lead cease-fire rally near White House: "The protesters urged the Biden administration to prevent 'a chain of reactions that would be catastrophic for a lot of people.'"

• Basil Farraj: [10-21] Israel steps up its war against Palestinian prisoners: "Israel has almost doubled the Palestinian prison population since October 7."

• Gershom Gorenberg: [10-20] How West Bank settlements led to the conflict in Gaza: "Having to defend them clearly imperils Israeli security."

• Chris Hedges: [10-22] Let them eat cement: "Israel is not only decimating Gaza with airstrikes but employing the oldest and cruelest weapon of war -- starvation."

• Ellen Ioanes: [10-21] Israelis feel abandoned by Netanyahu after October 7: "A recent poll shows high support for a group invasion in Gaza but dismal numbers of the prime minister."

• Colby Itkowitz: [10-11] Democratic divisions over Israel resurface after 'cease-fire' comments: "Democrats harshly rebuked several left-leaning lawmakers who have called for a 'cease-fire' as Israel-Gaza war escalates."

• Sarah Jones: [10-19] The Palestinian blood on America's hands. Quotes Biden as saying: "The Israelis are gonna do everything in their power to avoid the killing of innocent civilians." Everything? All they would have to do is stop the bombing. Are they stopping the bombing? Biden's credulity here is mind-boggling. Especially coming right after Biden saying: "Israel is going after a group of people who have engaged in barbarism that is as consequential as the Holocaust." About 1,300 Israelis have been killed in this event. That's awful, but not even a rounding error compared to the Holocaust. Worse than the Holocaust? That's not exactly going to encourage Israel "to avoid the killing of innocent civilians."

• Robert Kuttner: [10-13] Israel's dwindling moral high ground: Imagine an alternate world where Israel stopped at repairing the breach in the wall, and didn't go on to bomb Gaza and threaten genocide. A little restraint would have argued for their innocence, putting a little distance between the Hamas attack from the 75 years of Israeli attacks that preceded it, and making it much easier to negotiate a way out of this disaster. But Netanyahu just had to show Gaza (and the world) how tough and intemperate Israel could be, as if anyone needed reminding. Similarly, the world would have remained very sympathetic to the US after 9/11, instead of being forced to recognize GW Bush as the sniveling warmonger he really was.

• Eric Lipton: [10-17] Middle East war adds to surge in international arms sales.

• Branko Marcetic: [10-20] Forget 'peace,' did Abraham Accords set stage for Israel-Gaza conflict?

• John Nichols: [10-21] Blessed be the peacemakers, unless they raise their voices in Washington.

• Peter Oborne/Jamie Stern-Weiner: [10-17] Why settlers want war in the West Bank.

• Christian Paz: [10-20] What do leftist critics of Israel do now?

• Mitchell Plitnick: [10-20] Biden's Mideast policy implodes.

• Nathan J Robinson: [10-20] The current Israel-Palestine crisis was entire avoidable: Interview with Jerome Slater, author of Mythologies Without End: The US, Israel, and the Arab-Israeli Conflict 1917-2020.

• Raz Segal: [10-13] A textbook case of genocide: "Israel has been explicit about what it's carrying out in Gaza. Why isn't the world listening?"

• Omar Shakir/Yasmine Ahmed/Akshaya Kumar: [10-20] We are seeing urgent signs of more mutual mass atrocities to come in Israel and Gaza.

• Jonah Shepp: [10-22] Don't blame Gazans for Hamas: "The terrorist group has never been very popular among the people it rules." At this point, I'm not sure what Hamas really is or isn't, other than a figment of Israel's propaganda ministry. But when Israel says they're taking out Hamas, they're really just aiming to punish Palestinians, because, like they learned from the British, they've always been about collective punishment.

• Richard Silverstein:

  • [10-17] Stop the genocide, 500 die in hospital bombing, forensic analysis declares IDF responsible.

  • [10-21] Israel bombed Gaza hospital and lied about it.

  • [10-22] Israeli security think tank proposes expelling 2-million Gaza Palestinians.

• Noga Tarnopolsky: [10-21] How Biden bigfooted Bibi: "The American president has captured Israeli hearts. Can he rein in the Israeli government?" Is he even trying?

• Nahal Toosi: [10-20] 'There are options for Israel that do not involve killing thousands of civilians': "A now-former US official explains why he resigned rather than pave the way for more arms transfers to Israel as it battles Hamas." Josh Paul was the one who resigned.

• Jeff Wise: [10-19] How long can Gaza survive without water?

Trump, and other Republicans:

• Philip Bump: [10-17] Why Jim Jordan's speaker bid failed -- for now.

• David Dayen: [10-18] Ken Buck gets his revenge on Jim Jordan.

• Norman Eisen/Joshua Kolb: [10-21] MAGA lawyers take a sweetheart deal for democracy. Trump should be frightened: "Why the Kenneth Chesebro and Sidney Powell" plea deals matter."

• Ben Jacobs: [10-20] Republicans started a civil war they don't know how to end.

• Michael Gold: [10-20] Mitt Romney's sickest burns: Book reveals harsh views of fellow Republicans.

• Kelly McClure: [10-20] "Beyond the warning stage": Trump fined for violating gag order.

• Andrew Prokop: [10-20] The GOP speaker contest has entered its "who?" era: Jim Jordan lost.

• Joyce Vance: [10-22] More bad news for Trump.

Legal matters and other crimes:

• Ian Millhiser: [10-19] The Supreme Court considers whether a very stupid gun law is also unconstitutional: "What should the Supreme Court do when gun laws are written by incompetent trolls?"

Ukraine War:

• Blaise Malley: [10-20] Diplomacy Watch: Can aid package overcome 'Ukraine fatigue'?

• Anatol Lieven: [10-19] The perilous pursuit of complete victory in Ukraine.

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Other stories:

Brian Merchant: [10-20] On social media, the 'fog of war' is a feature, not a bug. "Even if that haze has occasionally been punctured for the greater good, as when it's been used for citizen journalism and dissident organizing against oppressive regimes, social media's incentive structure chiefly benefits the powerful and the unscrupulous; it rewards propagandists and opportunists, hucksters and clout-chasers."

David Pogue: [10-19] My quest to downsize without throwing anything away: "A big old house full of belongings -- could I find them all a new life?"

Vincent Schiraldi: [10-16] Probation and parole do not make us safer. It's time to rethink them. Some troubling examples and statistics. Author also has a new book: Mass Supervision: Probation, Parole, and the Illusion of Safety and Freedom.

Jeffrey St Clair: [10-20] Born under punches: Counterpunch 30th anniversary.

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We went to the Global Learning Center's annual banquet on Saturday, where we were lectured by Bob Flax, past executive director of Citizens for Global Solutions, on the need for effective world government. I was pretty much aligned with their thinking 25 years ago, when I started thinking about some kind of major political book. I circulated a draft of about 50 pages to some friends, and every time I mentioned anything in that direction, I got savage comments from one reader. The gist of her comments was: no fucking way anything like that's going to fly. I had to admit she was right, which killed that book idea -- though after 2001 events suggested more urgent political book tasks.

Clearly, the idea of a benign global authority which can lawfully arbitrate disputes between nations has considerable appeal. Flax started his presentation by pointing out how the superior government of the US Constitution resolved disputes and standardized practices, at least compared to the previous Articles of Confederation. On the other, every government presents an opportunity for hostile takeover by special interests -- or for that matter, for its own bureaucratic interests. There are, of course, reasonable designs that could limit such downsides, but they will be resisted, and it doesn't take much to kill a process that requires consensus.

Consequently, I've found my thinking heading toward opposite lines. Instead of dreaming of an unattainable world order, why not embrace the fact that nations exist in a state of anarchy? It's been quite some time since I looked into the literature, but I recall that a fair amount of thought has been put into functioning of anarchist communities. The key point is that since no individual can exercise any real power over anyone else, the only way things get done -- at least beyond what one can do individually -- is through cooperative consensus-building.

The smartest political book to appear in the last 20-30 years is Jonathan Schell's The Unconquerable World -- maybe smarter than Schell realized, as he doesn't spend nearly enough time on the insight of his title. Yet, at least since 2000, efforts to conquer and occupy other parts of the world have nearly all been doomed to failure: the US in Afghanistan and Iraq (and Somalia and Libya and Syria); Saudi Arabia in Yemen; Russia in Ukraine; Israel in Gaza. None of these were what you'd call underdogs, yet they ultimately couldn't overcome the resistance of the people they meant to subdue. (China may prove an exception in Sinkiang, where they have huge advantages, but probably not in Taiwan, where they don't.)

Unable to conquer, the only recourse is to deal with the other nation as an equal, to show respect and to search out areas that may be mutually beneficial. American reliance on power projection and deterrence seems to be habitually baked in, which is strange, given that it has almost never worked. On the other hand, what has worked -- at least for US business elites (benefits for American workers are less plentiful) -- has been generous bilateral and multilateral engagement with "allies."

Of course, I didn't bring this up in the long Q&A period that followed. A who guy spends all his life working on a nice dream shouldn't have it trampled on just because I'm a skeptic, but also I doubt I could have expressed such a profound difference of opinion in a forum that was predisposed to the speaker. But had I spoken up, most likely I would have held myself to a smaller, tangential question: is anyone in his circles seriously talking about a right to exile? Sure, they are big on the ICC, which they see as necessary to enforce international laws against war crimes and human rights abuses. The ICC rarely works, as it depends on being able to get their hands on suspects. (I think it would work better as a reference court, where it could validate facts and charges, in absentia if necessary, but not punish individuals.)

A "right to exile" offers people convicted in one country the chance to go into exile elsewhere, if some other country decides the charges are political in nature or simply unjust. This is both a benefit to the individual freed and to the country, which no longer has to deal with a troublesome person. This is also likely to reduce the level of international hostility that is tied to the perception of people being treated unfairly. And it should reduce the incentive that countries have for prosecuting their own citizens. It could also reduce the need to determine whether immigrants need to be protected as refugees.

I've never seen anyone argue for such a right, but it seems to me that it would make the world a slightly better place. (When I looked up "right to exile," most references concern whether a state has a right to exile (or banish) its citizens -- something that is widely frowned upon. I could see combining both meanings, provided there is a willing recipient country, and the person is agreeable to the transfer.

I have a few dozen off-the-cuff ideas worth pitching, some simple and practical, others more utopian (for now, anyway). Paul Goodman wrote a book called Utopian Essays & Practical Proposals. That strikes me as a super subtitle, to say the least. His 1949 proposal for a car-free Manhattan still strikes me as a pretty good one.

Monday, October 16, 2023

Music Week

Expanded blog post, October archive (in progress).

Tweet: Music Week: 20 albums, 3 A-list

Music: Current count 41003 [40983] rated (+20), 27 [26] unrated (+1).

I worked up a monster Speaking of Which this week (9497 words, 125 links). It was a maddening process, as I kept tripping into rabbit holes and digging in even further, before punting, and repeating. A big part of the problem is that years of repetition has locked people into language and conceptual ruts that were designed to perpetuate conflict, to dehumanize opponents, and to justify abuse of power. I found myself having to define "war" -- as opposed to other degrees and durations of directed violence. I found myself trying to write some kind of disquisition on morality. I got stuck in questions of sequence and causality. And I could always reach back into an encyclopedia of historic facts to illustrate any point I wanted to make. But all the articles I was collecting were just spinning around, some damn near nonsensically.

Still, one point was instantly clear to me from the first reports: Israelis -- not all, but probably most, or at least most of the ones who have any actual political power -- want to empty the entire land of Israel/Palestine of Palestinians, and there are few if any limits to what they're willing to do to accomplish that goal. In other words, they are aiming for genocide, and they are looking for excuses to do it; perhaps I should say, for opportunities to get away with it?

This isn't a new sentiment. It was baked into Zionism from the beginning, but only surfaced as something one could say in 1936, when the Peel Commission proposed partition and forced "transfer" -- the first of many such euphemisms. The plan was put into practice in 1948, as the Deir Yassin massacre was staged to terrorize Palestinians into fleeing -- as more than 700,000 did during Israel's War of Independence. But in the 1967 war, Israel's plans for further mass expulsions had to be toned down to keep from offending the US and its allies (only about 200,000, of a growing population, fled). But as Israel's government has lurched ever more to the right, and as the US has become ever more subservient to Israel's right, the talk and action, especially led by the settlers, has only picked up, reaching a crescendo in the immediate aftermath of the Hamas attack.

The only way to stop this genocide is to make Israel ashamed for even thinking such thoughts. Railing against Hamas won't help. If anything, it only emboldens Israel.

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While I was working on this, I found it very hard to prospect for new music, and even harder to write about it. I got off on an odd r&b sax tangent early in the week. I was lucky to come up with three good new saxophone albums (Nachoff fell just shy of the mark with an excess of strings).

But what really made this week so difficult was the death of Donald Barnes (81), known to all of us as Tookie. He came into our lives when he married my dear cousin Jan in 1960. They grew up in Kinsley, KS, and married right out of high school. His father was a welder, and he learned that trade very young. They followed his father to a shop in Wyoming for a couple years, before coming back to Kansas. He got a job at Cessna, and they lived in Wichita for about a year when I was in 9th grade. Their love and friendship was about all that got me through that year. They adopted a daughter that year, Heidi, and I've never seen anyone as happy as he was when he signed the papers. Not long after that, they had a son, Patrick.

But Jan hated the big city, so they left, first to Hugoton in western Kansas, where he built feedlots, and then to Idaho to work on a pipeline. They wound up settling in Soda Springs, where he worked at Monsanto's phosphate plant, becoming an electrician as well as a welder. There was nothing mechanical he couldn't master. Someone once complimented me as the "most competent person" she had ever met. For me, that person was Tookie.

Jan refused to go to college, and wound up working low-paid jobs which she was totally overmatched for. But they loved the outdoors, camping, and hunting. Tookie was an artist, hunting elk with bow and arrow, tying his own flies, crafting antique guns (including a blunderbuss). But the moose head that dominates their living room was Jan's doing. He was quiet and fastidious, with a sly and mischievous sense of humor. She was a force of nature, energizing all around her. She was (well, is) one of the most formidable cooks in the family, continuing to make industrial quantities of bread and rolls for her local farmers market each week. They've always struck me as one of the world's most perfectly suited couples.

I could dredge up dozens, maybe hundreds, of stories, missing only a stretch in the middle of our lives when distance kept us apart. First time Laura and I took a trip together, we went to Yellowstone, then to Soda Springs to see Jan and Tookie. Heidi had been to college, but was there and proclaimed us "perfect for each other," which pretty much sealed the deal. We won't talk about politics here, except to note that no matter we might have disagreed on those things, it never got in the way of our love for each other.

---

New records reviewed this week:

• Tyler Childers: Rustin' in the Rain (2023, Hickman Holler/RCA): [sp]: B+(***)
• Caroline Davis' Alula: Captivity (2021 [2023], Ropeadope): [cd]: A-
• Quinsin Nachoff: Stars and Constellations (2022 [2023], Adyhâropa): [cd]: B+(***)
• Angelika Niescier/Tomeka Reid/Savannah Harris: Beyond Dragons (2023, Intakt): [sp]: A-
• Bailey Zimmerman: Religiously: The Album (2023, Warner Nashville/Elektra): [sp]: B+(**)

Recent reissues, compilations, and vault discoveries:

None.

Old music:

• Little Willie Jackson & the Original Honeydrippers: Jazz Me Blues [The Legendary Modern Recordings] (1947-48 [2000], Ace): [r]: A-
• Willis Jackson: The Remaining Willis Jackson 1951-1959 (1951-59 [2005], Blue Moon): [r]: B+(*)
• Willis Jackson/Pat Martino: Willis . . . With Pat (1964 [1998], 32 Jazz): [sp]: B+(**)
• Willis Jackson/Richard "Groove" Holmes: Live on Stage (1980 [2003], Black & Blue): [sp]: B+(***)
• Wild Bill Moore: The Complete Recordings Volume 1: 1945-1948 (1945-48 [2004], Blue Moon): [r]: B+(**)
• Wild Bill Moore: The Complete Recordings Volume 2: 1948-1955 (1948-55 [2004], Blue Moon): [r]: B+(***)
• Wild Bill Moore: Bottom Groove (1961 [2002], Milestone): [r]: B+(**)
• Sam Price and the Rock Band: Rib Joint: Roots of Rock and Roll (1956-59 [1979], Savoy): [sp]: B+(***)
• The Roots of Rock'n Roll (1948-57 [1977], Savoy): [r] [yt]: B+
• Zoot Sims: For Lady Day (1978 [1991], Pablo): [sp]: B+(**)
• Zoot Sims: The Swinger (1979-80 [1981], Pablo): [sp]: B+(**)

---

Unpacking: Found in the mail last week:

• Atlantic Road Trip: One (Calligram) [11-03]
• Dave Bayles Trio: Live at the Uptowner (Calligram) [11-03]
• Mike DiRubbo: Inner Light (Truth Revolution) [11-17]
• Scott Hesse Trio: Intention (Calligram) [11-03]
• Steve Million: Perfectly Spaced (Calligram) [11-03]
• Russ Spiegel: Caribbean Blue (Ruzztone Music) [10-23]
• Kevin Sun: The Depths of Memory (Endectomorph Music) [10-27]

Daily Log

In response to yesterday's post, I received an email titled "tom hull, bibi supporter," with a screenshot image of this quote:

"Anyone who wants to thwart the establishment of a Palestinian state has to support bolstering Hamas and transferring money to Hamas," he [Netanyahu] told a meeting of his Likud party's Knesset members in March 2019. "This is part of our strategy -- to isolate the Palestinians in Gaza from the Palestinians in the West Bank."

I got this because I wrote a paragraph suggesting that the best solution at this point would be for Israel to cut Gaza loose, as a free country (ok, with some restrictions, but free of Israeli control and terror). Many, perhaps most, Palestinians don't like this idea, presumably because they still want a single Palestinian state (either in the whole of Palestine, or in something version of the "two-state solution"). The idea that Netanyahu shares this idea is ridiculous, as is the charge that I'm a "bibi supporter." Netanyahu, like all Israelis in any position of power, has never seriously entertained the idea of freeing Gaza. The Israelis refuse to admit the possibility of any kind of Palestinian state, even in a territory (Gaza) that they have no interest in occupying. Their position is one of pure spite.

I've never described myself as "pro-Palestinian" or "pro-Israeli." I'm "pro-peace," and I understand that to require some minimal level of justice and equal rights. But I'm also realistic enough to know that the only peace that is possible is one Israel is willing to grant. It should be possible to persuade Israel to cut Gaza loose: it costs them very little, except for giving up a measure of control that frankly they have neither the skill nor fortitude to exercise. East Jerusalem and the West Bank is another story. They've made it clear that they're going to finish annexing those lands. What happens to the people is an open question, for which most Israelis have very harsh preferences. But if you subtract Gaza -- and the rest of the Palestinian refugees, which I see as a dead issue -- the case for integrating the remaining Palestinians as equal Israeli citizens becomes more palatable, and infinitely preferable to the prevailing trend, which is heading toward genocide.

Still not very good odds at present, but last week and this should impress on any remaining sane and decent minds the need to do something before it's too late.

Sunday, October 15, 2023

Speaking of Which

Blog link.

Note: I ran out of time Sunday evening, so I posted what I had, hoping to fill it out with my usual sources and clean it up and repost Monday. I've added a few things (none new articles -- the Kaplan and Silverstein sections are largest, and a couple links to MEE), but my eyes are glazing over, and I need to take a break and move on to other things. So I've done very little rewriting, and no reorganizing. Sorry about that. Consider this final for the week. I believe that there are enough ideas and words here for a coherent essay, but despair of getting them structured right.

I started writing an introduction on Friday night, and spent all of Saturday laboring over it, only to find it impossible to say everything I wanted to say in the limited time I had. What I wrote wasn't worthless, so when I hacked it out, I moved it to the end of this post. It is, however, incomplete, and not as convincingly fleshed out as I would like. I did manage to write up a fantasy sketch on how what they're calling the "Israel-Hamas War" might come to a soft landing, given a considerable (and unexpected) change of heart in Jerusalem and Washington (and probably Cairo).

That's followed by one paragraph on why that's unlikely, which I might have followed up with three or four more on the genocidal psychology Israelis have cultivated for over a century. (It predates the Holocaust, which itself was the ultimate example of nationalist, colonial, and imperialist plots against whole peoples. I could give you a long list, probably starting with the extermination of the Arawak in Hispaniola, but one vivid example from American memory if the Trail of Tears. By the way, the deeply cultivated memory of the Holocaust in Israel probably acts more to inhibit its repeat than to inspire it, which is one reason why it's so difficult to write up analogies between Nazis and Israelis -- not because they boggle the imagination but because they're often so easy: you won't find a closer historical antecedent to the eruption from Gaza that started this episode than the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.)

---

My wife also recommended this piece, dated [2018-08-14], so old as news goes, but had the movement it covers been more successful, we might be having less news this week: Nathan Thrall: BDS: How a controversial non-violent movement has transformed the Israeli-Palestinian debate. I've said a lot of negative things lately about sanctions, especially as a much-overused tool of American foreign policy, but in all things you need to consider the circumstances and the alternatives. One key case where a BDS campaign was successful in affecting much-needed change was South Africa. As with Israel, the established Apartheid regime was so entrenched and so powerful it was hard to imagine them getting overthrown, and impossible to think that a foreign power might persuade them. Yet economic pressure, along with an appeal to conscience, finally did the trick.

Perhaps the single best book I've read on Israel is Richard Ben Cramer's How Israel Lost: The Four Questions (2004). He starts with an old Jewish parable which I'd have to look up to get right, but it basically says never give in to pressure now when you can put it off until later. Israeli leaders (even Netanyahu) have always been smart and flexible. They've repeatedly conceded points, but almost never have they followed up on those concessions. They begged for the UN partition resolution in 1947, then ignored its borders. They agreed to cease fires, only to reload and resume the attack. They signed armistices in 1949-50, promising to turn them into peace treaties, but never did. When Eisenhower insisted they halt the 1956 war, they did, but dragged their feet for six months on the necessary withdrawal. They agreed to UN resolutions after the 1967 and 1973 wars, then made a mockery of them, annexing Jerusalem and the Golan Heights. They invaded Lebanon in 1978, and when Carter insisted that they withdraw, they did . . . until they invaded again in 1982, which Reagan let them get away with. The signed the Oslo Accords, then dragged their feet, taking advantage of a loophole allowing "natural growth" of settlements. Even Netanyahu signed the Wye River Accord, then did nothing to implement it. The list goes on and on and on, but they got away with it, because in the end no one (well, other than Eisenhower) held them to their word. Give them an inch, they'll take a couple feet, then pretend you didn't understand, and talk about what great allies we are. That all fits the parable in the book.

The other point of the book is that Jewish Israel is actually divided into several distinct camps that basically don't like each other. But the conflict, having a common enemy, holds them together, so much so that they fear dissolution and despair if they should ever lose that common bond. And that conflict, not just the local one with Palestinians but the global, existential one between Jew and Gentile, is baked into every nook and cranny of their culture, their very being, the space they inhabit. The Holocaust Museum has halls full of nightmares, but you exit onto a hilltop overlooking Jerusalem, and that's Israel's deliverance, or at least that's the lesson. Cramer's book is 20 years old now, so he's not totally up to date. He hadn't yet seen how tightly wound that psyche would become, how viciously it would explode. Max Blumenthal's 2013 book, Goliath: Life and Loathing in Greater Israel, was one of the first to really expose that, though books on the settler movement offered glimpse of that earlier (e.g., Idith Zertal and Akiva Eldar: Lords of the Land: The War for Israel's Settlements in the Occupied Territories, from 2007).

Back around 2005, someone wrote to me and asked whether I thought Israel would commit genocide. I don't have the letter any more, but my answer was basically no. While there were forces, from deep within the racist, colonialist soul of Zionism, that could drive them in that direction, there were also other forces that would inhibit them, and save them from going off the deep end. I'm still not sure they will go through with it, but they're talking the talk, and walking the walk. And the time has come to talk them off the ledge.

---

Top story threads:

Israel/Gaza: I just grabbed a lot of articles below. I'm less interested in detailing the atrocities than I am with the broader thinking about the war and its future consequences. There's way too much here to fully digest, but I think the outlines and imperatives are clear. The outline: that despite the initial shock, the only story now is Israel's (and the world's) response. The imperative: to talk Israel down from committing genocide. As usual, there is a lot of good reporting at Middle East Eye, MondoWeiss, +972 Magazine, Tikkun Olam.

[PS: As I was trying to wrap this up, there is this report: Egypt-Gaza crossing set to open for aid, says Blinken; 24 hours' more fuel at Gaza hospitals, says UN.}

• Vox: [10-13] 7 big questions about the Israel-Hamas war, answered: I could quibble on various points, but this is a reasonable starting point, especially if you don't have a lot of specialist knowledge. The questions:

  1. Where does the conflict currently stand?
  2. What do I need to understand about Gaza and Israel's relationship to understand today?
  3. But why did Hamas launch such a huge attack now?
  4. How did this become an outright war, worse than we've seen in decades?
  5. What will declared war mean?
  6. How is the US responding?
  7. What does this mean for the region -- and the world?

• Yuval Abraham: [10-13] Settlers take advantage of Gaza war to launch West Bank pogroms.

• Jonathan Alter: [10-11] Will Netanyahu survive the fallout? He didn't deserve to survive the last twenty years, or for that matter his brief term as Prime Minister back in the 1990s, so clearly his brand of oily but intransigent malevolence appeals to many Israelis. Whether they can also stomach the incompetence is an open question. I'm not surprised that Scher has no real insight into this. His turf is as a centrist Democrat, which leads to one of the stupidest lines I've read this week: "The war gives [Biden] a chance to address the nation about the need to protect both Ukraine and Israel from aggression -- to lump Vladimir Putin in with Hamas by explaining that both of them hate freedom and kill children." The wars are similar only in the sense that the US is backing the side that wants the land but not the people, who don't want our side (dare I say it, that want to be free of our side?). But Ukraine, at least, is fighting a well-armed foreign adversary, and they genuinely need our help. Israel doesn't need our help, except to restrain them from doing unimaginably horrible things. Sending them more arms won't do that.

• Bernard Avishai: [10-15] l Can White House diplomacy prevent escalation in Gaza and beyond? They're not off to a good start. It's hard to impart wisdom when you got your head stuck up Netanyahu's ass . . . especially if you didn't have any wisdom in the first place. But at some point, Israel is going to become an embarrassment, even for someone as shameless as Biden.

• Ramzy Baroud:

  • [10-11] The Gaza war is lost: But will Netanyahu concede?

  • [10-13] A day to remember: How 'Al-Quds Flood' altered the relationship between Palestine and Israel forever.

• Zack Beauchamp: [10-11] How to think morally about the Israel-Hamas war: I hate to say this, but this feels like a guide to becoming pompous and irrelevant. Sure, it's easy to sit far removed from the fracas and condemn this or that, and there may be some intellectual satisfaction in that exercise. But that's a luxury, not just because you're safe, but because you get to judge a hypothetical rendition of events, filtered through the language and cognitive constructs you are comfortable with. Consider this:

  We can and should extend sympathy to Israeli victims, but we should not let that shade into justification for retaliatory atrocities. We should condemn Hamas terrorism, but we should also condemn Israeli abuses against Gazans.

  Why the qualifier "Israeli victims" but no qualifier for "retaliatory atrocities"? It's unclear whether he means "victims who are Israeli" or "victims of Israelis." And why distinguish "retaliatory" from any other kind of atrocities? Then note the word choices in the last line: why is it "Hamas terrorism" but "Israeli abuses"? "Abuse" is far from the most precise description of dropping bombs from F-15s. But "terrorism" -- which Beauchamp uses repeatedly -- bothers me more, as it's been used for decades now as code for evil souls who can only be stopped with killing. The only thing Israelis (and Americans) hear after "Hamas terrorism" is "we support you in killing them." So if that's not our intent, we should find better ways of talking about this.

• Peter Beinart: [10-14] There is a Jewish hope for Palestinian liberation. It must survive.

• Marin Cogan: [10-13] There's no Jewish American consensus about the conflict in Israel and Gaza: "Attitudes toward Israel were already changing. The unfolding violence is making it even more complicated."

• Roy Cohen: [10-15] Families of Israelis abducted to Gaza decry government's 'abandonment'.

• Jonathan Cook: [10-08] The West's hypocrisy towards Gaza breakout is stomach-turning: Written early, but revised three days ago.

• Ryan Costello: [10-12] 'Freezing' Iran's humanitarian fund is self defeating: Not sure whether Biden did this due to Israeli orders or simple panic over Republican talking points, but neither is a good look -- especially as all it proves is that America is an unreliable diplomatic negotiator, likely to double cross you at the first opportunity.

• Jamil Dakwar: [10-13] Neither Palestinians nor Israelis will be safe unless all are safe.

• Badia Dwaik: [10-15] Israel is besieging the West Bank as it decimates Gaza: "While the world's eyes are on Israel's genocidal war in Gaza, Israel has also put the entire West Bank on lockdown. We are living under siege."

• Elizabeth Dwoskin: [10-14] A flood of misinformation shapes views of Israel-Gaza conflict: "The barrage of false images, memes, videos and posts -- mostly generated from within the region itself -- is making it difficult to assess what is real."

• Stefanie Fox: [10-13] Jewish grief must not be used as a weapon of war: "we cannot sit back while Israel uses our trauma as a reason to destroy Gaza."

• Masha Gessen: [10-13] The tangled grief of Israel's anti-occupation activists. As one put it: "We've warned for a long time. But, when it actually happens, it's the most devastating thing." In my experience, we actually pull our punches, out of an overabundance of caution, or simply the dread that if our worst imagined scenarios came true, our thinking of them may have contributed, or more likely simply be blamed. I'm reminded of Nicholson Baker's Human Smoke: while the pacifists were brushed aside (or in many cases incarcerated) once the US entered WWII, during the 1930s they were often the only ones who anticipated the horrors to come, and who tried to raise the alert.

• Omar Ghraieb: [10-12] As darkness descends on Gaza, I yearn for the world to see us, too.

• Rebecca Maria Goldschmidt: [10-13] This is genocide: All out to end the war on Gaza.

• Neve Gordon: [10-13] Can Netanyahu survive Hamas's attack on Israel? Unlike Jonathan Alter (above), someone who actually knows something about Israeli politics.

• Nicholas Grossman: [10-11] Trump's overrated peace plan helped enable the horrors in Israel and Gaza: Well, it was Kushner's plan, and the real goal was to get billions of Arab dollars for his investment fund, among other grafts. But Trump's concessions to Israel certainly added to their hubris.

• Jonathan Guyer: [10-14] How the Arab world sees the Israel-Palestine conflict: "Demonstrations of solidarity with Palestinians have broken out across the Arab world this week." This will only increase as the extreme cruelty of Israel's siege continues, and the failure of America and Europe to restrain Israel becomes more obvious. Guyer refers back to his article: [02-06] The US's empty commitment to a two-state solution.

• Tareq S Hajjaj: [10-15] This could be my last report from Gaza: "Keep my stories alive, so that you keep me alive."

• Benjamin Hart: [10-13] What Israel didn't understand about Hamas: Interview with Michael Milshtein, a former Israeli intelligence officer, an associate of Benny Gantz. I don't have any real insight into Hamas, but I don't buy this take, let alone the blanket demonization that goes with the drive to exterminate everyone associated with them. Early on Hamas was basically a charitable community organization, and later they transformed into a political party to challenge Fatah. Like Fatah, they spun off an armed wing, a rival to Islamic Jihad, and possibly others, but they seemed to have always had a function in civil society. Israel has always done much to control the public perception of Palestinian groups. Early on Israel seemed to boost Hamas as a lever against the PLO. During the second intifada, there was a period when every time Hamas would attack, Israel retaliated by shelling Arafat's headquarters -- hard to paint that as deterrence against Hamas. While I don't doubt that Hamas-affiliated groups led this attack, the idea of calling this the Israel-Hamas War seems to involve some sleight of hand. Especially as Israel has no ability and probably no incentive to distinguish between Hamas and any other Palestinians. The real war here is between Israel and the people of Gaza, and by "war" I mean massacre. Hamas is mostly just a brand that Israel uses for people they want to kill.

• Hanine Hassan: [10-12] Israel-Palestine war: Mass slaughter in Gaza lays bare the depth of western racism.

• Maha Hilal: [10-15] Israel's war isn't against Hamas -- it's on the Palestinian people.

• Ellen Ioanes:

  [10-15] Gaza's spiraling humanitarian crisis, explained: "Israel's evacuation order is creating chaos in Gaza. A ground invasion will be worse." Consider this: "Though Israeli military policy is to use disproportionate force in Gaza as a deterrent strategy, that has so far failed to enact durable security, limit Hamas's ability to strike Israel, or allow space in Israeli politics for any sort of political negotiation that could lead to a more peaceful future."

  • [10-14] How does Iran fit into the war between Israel and Hamas?

• Donald Johnson: [10-15] How would the 'NY Times' know if Israel valued human life? They say it over and over again, "but a reexamination of Times coverage of Israel's 2018 massacre of peaceful protesters in Gaza shows that the Times itself does not uphold such values."

• Fred Kaplan:

  • [10-10] The U.S. and Israel are walking a tightrope, and the stakes are high.

  • [10-11] Netanyahu is sharing power with one of his most popular political opponents. It could keep a broader war at bay.

  • [10-16] What is Israel's strategy now? I can't really navigate my brain through these labrythine articles, but the way I read the situation is that in public Netanyahu wants to come off as maximally hard (which is to say genocidal) and Biden wants to come off as totally loyal (which is, well, stupid). On the other hand, they both have underlings (at least now that Benny Glantz is in Israel's coalition) who share their basic worldviews but understand that implementing them isn't so simple, and carries some serious risks. That opens up a lot of hypothetical angles that are really just speculation until they aren't. For instance, "If Qatar can get Hamas to release all the hostages today, it is possible that Israel would agree to call off the invasion." Really? That would be sensible, but would be a major shift in strategy, for all concerned. There are lots of details here if you're into that sort of thing. But no answers.

• Rashid Khalidi: [10-15] The U.S. should think twice about Israel's plans for Gaza.

• Eric Levitz:

  • [10-11] A left that refuses to condemn mass murder is doomed: This came early enough in the cycle that he's focusing on anyone on the left who failed to immediately join the pro-Israeli chorus in condemning the first (and really only) wave of Hamas attacks, lecturing us that "it is therefore imperative for progressives to disavow all apologia for Hamas's atrocities and for the broader public to understand that the left's analysis of the conflict's origins, and its prescriptions for its resolution, are wholly extricable from the blood lust of a loud minority of pseudo-radicals." This is one of several articles noted here (like Beauchamp above, and Wright below) to harp on proper etiquette in responding to outbreaks of violence. He offers several examples that fell short of his standards, then inflates them to "it is not hyperbole to say that many left-wing supporters of Palestine celebrated Hamas's atrocities." Many? How sure are you that "supporters of Palestine" are left-wingers? Personally, I'm enough of a pacifist that I don't have a problem with condemning all acts of violence, but most people have more complex feelings about violence. For instance, we routinely applaud when somebody smites down the bad guy in a movie. (As Todd Snider put it, "in America we like our bad guys dead!") And what difference does me or you condemning someone make anyway? Sure, when people like Netanyahu, Biden, or whoever runs whatever faction of Hamas can make their condemnations felt, as can the soldiers who follow them, but you and me? We're mostly just expressing our moral sense, a luxury we enjoy because we aren't connected to the people we presume to judge. And, let's face it, we're doing it hastily on the basis of very little, and probably very faulty, information. I mean, I get where Levitz is coming from, because as a leftist, my politics reflects, and is an expression of, my moral sense, and I want them to be consistent and universal. But I also find it hard to condemn someone for trying to break out of jail and stand up to a power that had for all his life punished him and everyone he grew up with, even if that person wound up harming someone else. Sure, that's not something I would do, but I'm not in Gaza, and I've never had to live that life. I truly don't know what I'd do in his shoes. But what I am certain of is that in standing up to Israel, he was bound to die, and that, regardless of whether he killed or not, his defiance would be taken by Israelis as justification to punish more people in Gaza, more severely than ever before. As a leftist, I could go on and condemn Israel for their retaliation, as I had condemned them for their past transgressions (not that it did or will do any good). However, I can see one argument for not condemning the Palestinian kid who breaks out of jail and goes on a rampage: I'm not adding my voice to the clamor urging Israel to multiply his violence many times over.

    I could have phrased this many different ways. I could have brought up examples, like a slave revolt, or a kidnapping, where one would have been less likely to instinctively blame a person for fighting back. I don't, for instance, blame Ukrainians for fighting back against Russian invasion. It's human nature to resist attack and oppression. (And if you think this case is one where Hamas is invading Israel, you need to reconsider your facts.) But sure, if you want reassurance that I'm not in favor of Hamas any or all Israelis, I will give you that, but I'll try to phrase it in a way that doesn't support Israel's many crimes.

    One last point here: this article basically does the leg work, complete with quotes usable out of context, for someone else's anti-left tirade. Levitz may not be wrong in what he says, but he's giving us a lecture most of us don't need, and he's giving ammunition to our enemies, in many cases the same people who are clamoring for genocide against Gaza.

  • [10-13] The US is giving Israel permission for war crimes.

  • [10-13] No, America's declining power didn't cause Hamas's attacks. Evidently, some pundits who think America should throw its weight around more (huh?) have come up with this line -- names dropped her include David Leonhardt, Noah Smith, and Ross Douthat.

• Gideon Levy:

  [10-09] Israel can't imprison two million Gazans without paying a cruel price.

  • [10-14] The world cannot stand by and watch this slaughter.

• Nicole Narea: [10-13] How the US became Israel's closest ally: Whole books have been written on this, dating back to Kathleen Christison's Perceptions of Palestine: Their Influence on US Middle East Policy (1999), with John B Judis: Genesis: Truman, American Jews, and the Origins of the Arab/Israeli Conflict (2014) focusing on Israel's creation. But while American sympathies with Israel grew mostly through Democratic presidents from Truman through Clinton, they shifted when GW Bush's neocons explicitly aligned with the Israeli right to destroy the Oslo framework and use Israel as a free agent in striking out at supposed enemies like Iran. Obama struggled to return to a Clinton-level of fawning embrace, but by then the "facts on the ground" and the hardening of Israel's right had made that impossible, so he ultimately gave up. (Josh Ruebner's Shattered Hopes: Obama's Failure to Broker Israeli-Palestinian Peace covers this, as does Trita Parsi's A Single Roll of the Dice: Obama's Diplomacy With Iran.) Trump, on the other hand, sided whole hog with Israel, and Biden has made no effort to reverse Trump's surrender (unlike in Europe and the Far East, where his reassertion of American leadership has already produced one war and made another more likely). While the bond has been real and deep, this has never struck me as a true alliance. Israel does what they want, and America helps clean up the mess. As Moshe Dayan put it: "America gives us arms, money, and advice. We accept the arms. We accept the money. We ignore the advice."

• John Nichols: [10-14] Israelis are rejecting Netanyahu. So why is Biden giving him a blank check?

• AW Ohlheiser: [10-12] Don't believe everything you see and hear about Israel and Palestine: "Misinformation about the Israel-Hamas war is easy to find online. Here's how to avoid spreading it." Fairly generic reminder about how social media is regularly used to spread propaganda and other mischief. The problem it doesn't go into is how readily mainstream media falls for carefully tailored propaganda lines.

• Kenn Orphan: [10-13] Israel and the Gaza prison break.

• Eve Ottenberg: [10-13] Euphemisms for war are deadly: "How we talk about war matters." Refers to David Vine's Words About War guide. Actually, I think these could use some more work. No doubt we should avoid "terrorists" -- it's not just a loaded word, by now it's become a conditioned reflex to kill -- but I'm not sure "militants" is a better alternative. That word is almost exclusively used these days as a synonym for "dead Palestinian male." I also want to note that while "ethnic cleansing" has come to the process of driving a group out of a land (as, for instance, is now happening in Nagorno-Karabakh, or happened in the 1830s with the Trail of Tears), the phrase was originally just a euphemism for mass killing (specifically, what the Serbs did at Srebrenica in 1995), a cutesy way of saying genocide.

• George Packer: Israel must not react stupidly: I didn't read this, due to the paywall, but I did manage a laugh. I counsel people against saying "never forget," but I guess I haven't. I then took a look at some of Atlantic's other links, reminding myself why I don't pay them money (besides that I'm cheap, I mean), and found: Conor Friedersdorf: "Students for Pogroms in Israel"; Helen Lewis: "The Progressives Who Flunked the Hamas Test"; and Bruce Hoffman: "Understanding Hamas's Genocidal ideology." They're all on board, though one article could go either way: Hussein Ibish: Israel is walking into a trap: "Storming into Gaza will fulfill Hamas's wish." The author is a resident scholar at an Arab think tank in Washington, and every reference to Hamas in what I can see links them to "their Iranian backers." The trap I see is that Israel will lose what little's left of their souls. He probably seems martyrdom of Hamas as feeding into Iran's bid for leadership of the Muslim world. I doubt that's even a fantasy in Tehran -- although the Saudis are still reeling from a nod in that direction back in 1979, when Ayatollah Khomeini was in the first throes of revolution, so it could well be on Ibish's agenda.

• Trita Parsi: [10-15] Biden refuses to talk 'ceasefire' though it could prevent a regional war: "It's strategic malpractice for the White House to give Israel carte blanche when he knows it could drag the US into a wider conflict." This isn't my big worry right now. Although Israel has shelled Lebanon and bombed Syria in recent days, their demonization of Iran has always been more about manipulating Washington than confronting a serious enemy. The real risk, short-term, is genocide in Gaza, and as that is unveiled -- and there's little chance that this one won't be televised -- the bad feelings that will be generated could come back to attack Israel and its allies (and the US is much more exposed than Israel is) in all sorts of unpredictable ways. And as long as the US and Israel remain committed to policies of massive reprisals, the real damage kicked off by provocations will mostly be self-inflicted. Why haven't they learned this much by now?

• Matthew Petti: [10-13] Why does Egypt fear evacuating Gaza?: As noted here, Azerbaijan recently solved its Armenian enclave problem by setting up a "humanitarian corridor," driving residents of Nagorno-Karabakh to escape to safety in Armenia. Israelis -- and it sounds like the US is going along with this -- have called for something like that to depopulate Gaza through Egypt, which doesn't like the idea, and has so far Moved to prevent exodus of Palestinians from besieged Gaza. An influx of two million Palestinians would cause significant stress to Egypt's fragile not-really-democracy, especially given that many would align with the banned Islamic Brotherhood, and many understand that Egypt's cozy collaboration with Israel and the US has kept Gaza isolated and precarious. As Israel's plan seems to be to kill everyone in Gaza who can't get out, exile doesn't sound like the worst possible outcome. On the other hand, if Israel gets away with the depopulation of Gaza, they're sure to try the same thing in the West Bank. One can even argue that with the government supporting settler pogroms, they've already started. The Nazis had a term for this: Judenrein. I wouldn't be surprised if there is an analogous Hebrew term, translating to "Arab-free."

• Mitchell Plitnick: [10-08] Hamas offensive the result of Washington's hostility to Palestinian rights.

• Vijay Prashad: [10-13] The savagery of the war against the Palestinian people.

• Meron Rapoport: [10-11] The end of the Netanyahu doctrine: "Did his plan to preserve Hamas in Gaza as a tool for keeping the strip separate from the West Bank and the Palestinian Authority weak finally backfire?"

• Nathan J Robinson: [10-14] You can't selectively pay attention to certain atrocities and ignore all others: "How is it possible to be outraged by Hamas killings of Israeli children, but ignore or rationalize the killing of Gazan children?"

• Kenneth Roth: [10-11] The attack on Israel has been called a '9/11 moment'. Therein lies a cautionary tale.

• David Rothkopf: [10-15] The war's just started, but Benjamin Netanyahu has already lost: "No matter what happens following Israel's siege of Gaza, the Israeli prime minister's political ambitions are likely damaged beyond repair."

• Richard Silverstein:

  • [10-09] Israel's Hannibal Directive: Israeli attack will likely result in 120 hostage deaths. Silverstein reported on the Hannibal Directive back in 2014: "a policy calling for the killing of Israeli soldiers who fall captive to Palestinian militants."

  • [10-10] Biden sends naval task force to warn Hezbollah, Iran against intervention.

  • [10-10] Israel planted Wall Street Journal leak claiming Iran ordered Gaza attack.

  • [10-12] Gaza: Chickens come home to roost: "Terror, hate and violence of Gaza war make their way to America's shores."

  • [10-13] Israel plans to ethnically cleanse Gaza: "IDF gives 1.5 million Gazans 24 hours to leave their homes, one of the greatest acts of ethnic cleansing since Bosnian War."

  • [10-15] Israeli security source confirms IAF massacred civilians in refugee convoy despite army denials, 70 dead.

• David Sirota:

  • [10-12] The fog of war in Israel and Palestine: "As the long-running quagmire erupts into more bloodshed and destruction, we need to stop dehumanizing the conflict and acknowledge both sides' pain and suffering." Benny Morris captured this sentiment in his title, Righteous Victims: A History of the Zionist-Arab Conflict, 1881-1999. However, beyond suffering, we also need to check who has the power and agency to actively reduce the pain and harm.

  • [10-14] The war on Gaza is the result of decades of extreme Israeli policy: Interview with Matt Duss and Daniel Bessner.

• Norman Solomon: [10-11] 'Israel's 9/11' is a slogan to rationalize open-ended killing of Palestinian civilians. It's also a phrase meant to appeal to Americans, and solicit their support for indiscriminate slaughter.

• Jeffrey St Clair: [10-13] Roaming Charges: Gaza without mercy: "You won't have to interrogate them afterward. They are explicit about the war crimes they're planning to commit." Sample quotes (read it all):

  When you declare total war against Gaza, which has been under perpetual siege since 1967 after being seized by Israel during the Six Day War, what is it you're going to war against? There are no airbases, no army bases, no tank battalions, no air defense systems, no naval ports, no oil refineries, no rail system, no troop barracks, no armored personnel carriers, no howitzers, no satellite systems, no attack helicopters, no fighter jets, no anti-tank batteries, no submarines, no command-and-control centers. Just people, most of them women and kids. It's why the entire population must be dehumanized, turned into "human animals" whose lives don't matter.

  The reaction in the US to Hamas's attacks was more hysterical, the calls for ultra-violence more grotesque, and the lack of dissent more uniform, than in Israel itself (which is saying something because Netanyahu blustered this week that "Every member of Hamas is a dead man").

  Former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley is considered one of the most reasonable of the current crop of Republicans. "Finish them." Genocide is now her campaign theme.

  Lindsey Graham has reverted back to John "Bomb-Bomb-Bomb Iran" mode: "We are in a religious war, and I am with Israel . . . Level the place."

  The obvious parallel to Gaza is the Tet Offensive, which was a defeat for the Vietnamese, but it was the defeat that won the war, exposing the vincibility of the US military machine. It also triggered something deep in the psyche of the American occupiers, who responded with attacks of pointless savagery. The massacres and gang rapes at My Lai were a direct response to Tet. Netanyahu has vowed that Israel's response will be equally sadistic, which is, of course, a sign of its own weakness -- moral and military -- and a harbinger of its ruin.

  The column eventually moves on to his usual wide range of issues, plus some books and music at the end.

• Bret Stephens: [10-15] Hamas bears the blame for every death in this war: I've mostly picked sensible, judicious opinion pieces, because they're the ones that deserve reading and distribution. But this one, obviously, is included just to show you how horrifically wrong an American pundit can be. The clear implication is that Israel's political leaders have no free will, no brains, no morals, no capacity for managing their own behavior. Sure, to some extent, that does seem to be the case, but to what extent won't be determined until Israel stops running up Hamas's tab. And here I was, foolishly thinking that not just people but nations should be responsible for whatever they do. [PS: Well, I also gotta admit some of this is pretty funny. E.g., the paragraph that begins with "But Hamas spends fortunes building a war machine whose only purpose is to strike Israel." Or: "Hamas launched an attack with a wantonness like what the Nazis showed at Babyn Yar." Nazi Germany attacked Russia with 134 divisions, about three million men, but at least Hamas matched their "wantonness"?]

• Matt Stieb: [10-13] The violence is spreading outside Gaza: The West Bank, obviously, where Ben-Gvir is distributing another 10,000 rifles to settlers, and the border with Lebanon, as Israeli rhetoric threatens to morph into open season on Palestinians, some of whom could be inspired to fight back. Not included here is another piece of spillover violence: Hannah Allam: [10-16] U.S.-born Palestinian boy stabbed to death in hate crime: six-year-old Wadea Alfayoumi, in Illinois.

• Noga Tarnopolsky:

  • [10-12] Netanyahu is losing the war at home: "Incompetence against Hamas and indifference to Israeli suffering has the public boiling over."

  • /Shira Rubin: [10-09] Israel massed troops in the West Bank. Then Hamas attacked from Gaza. They had to protect the settlers, encouraging them to harass Palestinians. The goal is clearly to push them off the land, into ghettofied cities, and ultimately dump them over the border. Gaza was less of a problem, because it was already a ghetto, with nothing left to pilfer.

• Kelley Beaucar Vlahos: [10-10] In blistering remarks, Biden commits aid, intel, and military assets to Israel.

• Kelley Beaucar Vlahos/Blaise Malley: [10-12] Presidential hopefuls outdo each other on Hamas, Israel war: "Candidates across the spectrum urge overwhelming force and blast Biden's weakness." Republican candidates, that is, although Biden's own statement came off as the strongest, because he didn't detract from his message by talking nonsense about anyone else, even Iran. The article credits Vivek Ramaswamy with "restraint," because he stopped short of committing the US to war against Iran. Marianne Williamson waffled a bit, while assuring us she hated Hamas. Cornel West had a more coherent critique of US/Israel, but he too took pains to condemn Hamas, giving you an idea of how deep the party line has sunk in. RFK Jr strayed from his fellow Republicans in applauding Biden's statement, but more verbosely. I don't mind if he describes the Hamas attack as "ignominious" and "barbaric," but "unprovoked"?

• Gidi Weitz: Netanyahu bolstered Hamas in order to thwart the creation of a Palestinian state.

• Robert Wright: [10-13] Israel, Hamas, and Biden's failed foreign policy: After linking to this piece, I started to write the original intro (now at the end of the post), so I lost the thread here. I will say that the idea that Hamas attacked to keep Saudi Arabia from joining the Abraham cartel is a lot like saying an estranged friend killed himself to spoil your birthday party. Sure, he spoiled your day, but how could you think that's really the point? The real reasons are probably as simple as: Hamas has been trying to figure how to make enough of an explosion to remind the world that Palestinians are suffering but can still hit back and make Israelis feel some of the pain they've long subjected to; and the 50th anniversary of the Yom Kippur War attack would heighten the element of surprise. The 1973 war was rebuffed easily enough, but the shock caused Israelis to doubt their security forces, and ultimately to negotiate peace with Egypt. But I doubt Hamas was so optimistic: they know better than anyone how determined Israel is to grind Palestine into oblivion. Second point, I really object to Wright's "assume that Hamas isn't motivated by actual concern for the Palestinian people." People who deliberately start doomed revolts may be misguided or foolish, but the idea of laying down your life to free your people goes way back, including every revolutionary we still honor, even as martyrs. I don't doubt that many Palestinians don't appreciate Hamas's efforts -- indeed, that they actively curse them -- but you need to understand their sacrifice, else you understand nothing.

• Here are a couple statements from concerned groups:

  • Boycott From Within: [10-13] Israel is annihilating Palestinian civilians in the Gaza ghetto.

  • Code Pink: [10-09] Peace comes with justice, not war.

  • Jewish Voice for Peace: [10-09] The root of violence is oppression.

  • Jewish Currents [Arielle Angel]: [10-12] "We cannot cross until we carry each other".

Trump, and other Republicans:

• Mariana Alfaro: [10-15] Trump-backed candidate wins Louisiana governor's race: Jeff Landry, no runoff necessary.

• Lindsay M Chervinsky: [10-13] Trump and the Republican war on the civil service: Trump's plan to scuttle the civil service, return to the "spoils system," and politicize every government job is easily on the top-ten list of reasons he should never hold elected office. (It's mind-boggling to contemplate listing the other nine, but this is a big one.)

• David A Graham: Trump's only real worldview is pettiness. This was triggered by some offhand comments about Netanyahu. For more, see:

  • Bill Scher: [10-12] Why is Trump trashing Netanyahu?

  • Margaret Hartmann: [10-12] Trump manages to make Israel attack all about him.

  • Fred Kaplan: [10-12] The more you think about this Trump speech, the worse it gets: That's the title on the link. When you get to the page, the title changes to "Trump somehow manages to make the Isreal-Hamas conflict all about him." Of course, Trump is, was, and always has been unfit to be president, but his tendency to go unscripted and blurt out things that no sober politician would ever admit is one of his few charms. While most of those things are incredibly stupid, or simply inane, every now and then he has a moment when he exposes the emperor's new clothes. My favorite was when he had the gall to make fun of Obama ending every speech with "God bless America." I suspect his irreverence for political pieties is a big part of his popular appeal. He has nothing insightful to say about Israel, Hamas, and/or Hezbullah, but that he isn't parroting the party line is, well, refreshing isn't the right word, but good for a laugh.

• Stephen Prager: [10-11] How the media turns extremists into "moderates": Case example, Nikki Haley.

• Andrew Prokop: [10-11] Republicans have nominated Steve Scalise for speaker. Now comes the hard part. Scalise defeated Jim Jordan 113-99, but as few as four Jordan supporters can keep him from being elected Speaker. PS: [10-12] Steve Scalise quits speaker race after humiliating 24 hours. Then: [10-13] Now it's Jim Jordan's turn to struggle to become speaker. More updates on the House:

  • Ben Jacobs:

    • [10-11] How Congress stumbled on the worst combination of representative government: Something I don't fully understand about how "the US House is acting like a parliament."

    • [10-13] The House Republicans are in a hell of their own making.

• Peter Wade: [10-15] Lindsay Graham: Trump praising Hezbollah was a 'huge mistake': Oh no, he's lost Lindsay again. What's the over-under on when they kiss and make up?

Biden and/or the Democrats:

• Ryan Cooper: [10-10] Why the full employment created by Bidenomics should be celebrated: "The economy has many problems. But the labor market hasn't been doing this well in many decades."

• Robert Kuttner: [10-11] Biden's latest initiatives against junk fees.

• Eric Levitz: [10-10] A wall won't keep Biden's border problem at bay: "Democrats face a political challenge with no legislatively viable solution."

• Dylan Scott: [10-13] Nearly 2 million kids have been kicked off Medicaid this year: "Medicaid unwinding's terrible toll, explained in 4 charts."

• Steve M: [10-15] Biden's competence is not as self-evident as he and his team think it is.

Legal matters and other crimes:

• Ian Millhiser: [10-11] The Supreme Court appears determined to make it easy to draw gerrymanders.

• Andrew Prokop: [10-12] New Bob Menendez indictment charges him with acting as a foreign agent for Egypt.

Climate and environment:

• Scott Dance: [10-13] A sudden spike in global warmth is so extreme, it's mysterious.

• Kasha Patel: [10-12] Forty percent of Antarctica's ice shelves are shrinking, worrying scientists.

• Timothy Puko: [10-09] Rich countries promised poor nations billions for climate change. They aren't paying.

Economic matters:

• Jessica Church: [10-09] The smart corporate tax idea that might have prevented the UAW strike: "targeting out-of-control CEO pay by using the tax code."

• Paul Krugman: [10-12] An economic Nobel for showing how much women matter: This year's winner is Claudia Goldin.

• Chris McGreal: [10-07] Angus Deaton on inequality: "The war on poverty has become a war on the poor": Interview.

• Maureen Tkacik/Claire Kelloway: [10-11] The no spin-off zone: "The Kroger-Albertsons merger shows us why regulators need to permanently divest the concept of, well, divesting."

Ukraine War:

• Blaise Malley: [10-13] Diplomacy Watch: Surprise, Putin and Zelensky don't agree on Gaza war. Zelensky is absolutely supporting Israel, but his analogies between Hamas and Russia are pretty tortuous, and before long he's going to fret about Israel jumping ahead of him in the arms pipeline. Putin, on the other hand, has resorted to saying things like: "I think that many people will agree with me that this is a vivid example of the failure of United States policy in the Middle East." Ok, nobody's going to agree with him, but the rest of the line is hard to argue against.

• Connor Echols: [10-10] GOP hawks slam Biden, say he has 'no strategy' for Ukraine: In particular, they want to make sure that no one in the administration is talking to Russia.

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Other stories:

Kyle Chayka: [10-09] Why the internet isn't fun anymore: "The social-media Web as we knew it, a place where we consumed the posts of our fellow-humans and posted in return, appears to be over." News to me, not that I'm unaware of the decline of fun.

Jim Geraghty: [10-12] Why RFK Jr.'s independent bid makes sense, even if he doesn't: Having gotten no traction running in the Democratic primary, with most of his support coming from Republicans just looking to muddy the waters, this move keeps him in the game, but it also changes the game. The real curse of the third-party candidate is that you have to spend so much time defending against charges of being some kind of spoiler you never get to talk about your platform, or why the two parties accorded a chance are wrong.

• Philip Bump: [10-11] Sean Hannity's predictable heel turn on RFK Jr. What happens when Hannity's favorite Democrat

Oshan Jarow: [10-13] Basic income is less radical than you think.

Sara Morrison: [10-11] We're in a new Gilded Age. What did we learn from the last one? Interview with Tom Wheeler, whose forthcoming book is Techlash: Who Makes the Rules in the Digital Gilded Age?

David Owen: [08-14] What happens to all the stuff we return?

Greg Sargent: [10-12] The GOP's 'southern strategy' mastermind just died. Here's his legacy. Kevin Phillips, dead at 82, wrote a book in 1969 called The Emerging Republican Majority, landing him a job in the Nixon White House. His painstaking research on voting trends not only validated the "southern strategy" -- Barry Goldwater and Strom Thurmond worked that hard in 1964 -- but showed Democrats losing their commanding position among Catholics and other ethnic groups (e.g., Spiro Agnew) in the north, especially as they moved to the suburbs or the "sun belt." In the late 1960s, I did roughly the same work, plotting election results from World Almanacs on county maps, so when I read Phillips book, I recognized many of the same patterns -- the main difference being that I had near-zero sense of ethnic identity, but also I was less pleased with his conclusions, and therefore more resistant. Sargent collected comments from several figures, none striking me as quite correct.

For example, Michael Barone points out that Eisenhower has already won 49-50 percent of the popular vote in the South, then claims that southern whites "turned away from national Democrats not so much because of civil rights but because of [McGovern's] dovishness." But Eisenhower's southern support was all in the peripheral states, where Republicans at least had a party structure. The deep south (South Carolina-to-Louisiana) flipped for Goldwater because the local Democrats did, as they did for Wallace in 1968). But by 1972, when Nixon swept the region, he was ducking his association with war, but dog-whistling race like crazy.

The Nixon strategy was more sophisticated than just playing up civil rights backlash. It was deeply rooted in his psyche as an all-American petit bourgeois everyman -- Gary Wills' Nixon Agonistes is probably still the most exacting psychological profile -- but he was smart, cunning, and ruthless. Phillips' job was to feed him data, but it's use was pure Nixon. (Pat Buchanan, who worked closely with Phillips, helped convert that data into the sort of bile Nixon could spew.) Nixon's use of Phillips is a big part of the reason Republicans are so artful at gerrymandering and other dark arts.

Not mentioned here are Phillips' other books. He started moving away from the Republican monster he had helped create, perhaps as early as 1982's Post-Conservative America, certainly by 1993's Boiling Point: Democrats, Republicans, and the Decline of Middle Class Prosperity. I didn't start paying much attention until his scathing 2004 book on the Bush family: American Dynasty: Aristocracy, Fortune, and the Politics of Deceit in the House of Bush. He followed that up with American Theocracy: The Peril and Politics of Radical Religion, Oil, and Borrowed Money in the 21st Century, which argued that financialization begot disaster in three world-empires (Netherlands, Britain, and most assuredly America next). That was 2006, so he was well prepared for 2008's Bad Money: Reckless Finance, Failed Politics, and the Global Crisis of American Capitalism.

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In a piece I cite below, Robert Wright starts by noting, in italics for emphasis:

This piece rests on my belief that the following two ideas are logically compatible: (1) Hamas is morally and legally responsible for the atrocities it committed against Israeli civilians; and (2) The US is responsible for policy mistakes that, over the years, have made violent attacks by Palestinian groups, including this attack, more likely. I've noticed, in the context of the Ukraine War, that some people find this approach to allocating responsibility not just wrong but outrageous and offensive. So I'm adding this preface as a kind of trigger warning.

The first point is the sort of boilerplate lawyers write, in this case to anticipate the moral judgments insisted on in Zack Beauchamp's essay (also cited below), so the author can move on to something more interesting than virtue signaling. I went ahead and quoted the rest of the note because he points out that critics of twenty-some years of American foreign policy toward Russia had to first condemn Putin's February 2022 invasion of Ukraine before we -- I did this, as did Wright, and even Noam Chomsky -- before we could get around to the background that one must understand in order to make any sense out of what Putin did (and again, we all had to reiterate that Putin was still in the wrong). Still, every time we did that, we helped validate the people who provoked as well as fought back against Russian aggression, freely ignoring any concerns or fears we had, or doubts about their motives.

I could go on about Ukraine -- I have in the past, and no doubt will again in the future -- but the point I want to make is: I'm not sure that we need to repeat this exercise here. Sure, if you could isolate select events in the initial Hamas attack, like the mass shooting at the concert, or the abduction of hostages, they were things we were shocked and appalled by. But the Hamas attack came up far short of a war. When Russia launched a war into Ukraine, they came with thousands of heavily armed troops, tanks, artillery, missiles, aircraft, a navy, backed by massive industry safely beyond reach of retaliation, one that could sustain operations for years with little fear of crippling losses.

What Hamas did was more like a jail break followed by a brief crime spree. They shot their wad all at once: a few thousand of their primitive rockets; 2,500 or so fighters infiltrated a few miles of Israeli territory, killing over 1,000 Israelis and taking 200+ captive. But that's basically it, and all it could ever be. Israel regrouped, killed or drove back all the fighters, patched the breaches in its defense. Hamas appears to have had no external coordination or support, and has no capability to inflict further significant damage on Israel. The attack was very dramatic, but never had a chance of being anything but a suicide mission. The only thing the attack could accomplish was to embarrass Israeli politicians, who had assured Israelis that their "iron wall" defense and the threat of massive, indiscriminate retaliation would keep them safe and render the Palestinians powerless. Unless, of course, Israelis responded in a way that exposed themselves as cruel and murderous. Which it was almost certain to do.

Even now, it isn't hard to think of a plausible path forward. Israel reseals its border, but ceases fire, contingent on no further fire from Gaza. (Similar cease fires have been negotiated many times before.) Israel allows humanitarian relief supplies to enter Gaza, under its inspection, and eventually via Egypt, as well as neutral observers and facilitators. They negotiate the release of hostages, with both sides committed to no more hostilities. Some number of refugees will be allowed out, to countries that agree to take them, with assurance that they will be allowed back in when requested. A non-partisan civil administration is constituted, in liaison with the UN, with a world-funded reconstruction budget. An indemnity fund will be set up and at least partly funded by Israel. Reparations will be drawn from this fund for any later cross-border damage by any source. Gun control will be implemented, and the region effectively disarmed. Egypt, with UN supervision, will assume internal security responsibility. Israel will renounce its claims to Gaza, which may remain independent or join Egypt. Other issues may be negotiated (e.g., water, air control).

Of course, this won't happen. Israel will insist on taking its revenge, and will kill a truly scandalous number of Gazans, further turning the area into a wasteland. Israel will probably get the hostages killed, and insist on taking further revenge for that. In short order, more people will die of starvation and disease than they can kill directly. Basically, they will kill and destroy until they tire and/or think better of it, then look to stampede whoever's left out the gate to Egypt, or let the American Navy organize a flotilla elsewhere -- like the service the British provided in 1948 moving Jaffa to Beirut. People will think up new euphemisms for this, but the root term is genocide.

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I also wrote this fragment, which got moved around and is now stranded:

Before we move on to Israel's response to the attack, we should ask ourselves why frequent critics of Israel, like Beauchamp and Wright, feel a need to condemn Hamas before they can point out that Israel has done some bad things too. For most on the left, that seems fair and consistent: we oppose inequity but also violence, and imagine a possible a path toward much greater equality that doesn't involve violence. That may make sense in a stable society with laws and a responsible system of justice, which is our default understanding of America (even though reality often disappoints).

But what if no paths are available? Does it even make sense to make moral judgments over people who have no viable options to achieve morally-justified ends? If you are at all familiar with the history and politics of Israel/Palestine, I shouldn't have to run through the many reasons why people in Gaza, especially Hamas, are denied such options. Nor why hopes for change have been utterly dashed by the trajectory of increasingly right-wing governments and international indifference, especially how the US has given up any pretense of being anything but an Israeli tool. Palestinians have tried nonviolence (appealing to international law) and have tried violence. Neither worked. As each fails, the other advances.

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